When it comes to handling money, many people today trust their phones more than their banks. Mobile payment, also known as M-payment or m-payment, is at the forefront of technical advancement, development, and the establishment of trust and security. As security has improved, the use of mobile funds transfer and transactions has increased in both the number and value of products and services purchased.
Mobile payment is relatively new and rapidly gaining popularity, particularly in Asia and Europe. A user can use a mobile phone to pay for a variety of services or hard products instead of using cash, check, or credit cards.
• Transportation fares (bus, subway, or train), parking meters, and other services;
• Music, videos, ringtones, online game subscriptions or commodities, wallpapers, and other digital goods;
• Hard products such as books, periodicals, tickets, and other physical items.
By 2013, the global market for all sorts of mobile payments is estimated to exceed $600 billion.
Convenience is everything in a world driven by networked communications. Mobile money gives your clients a cashless, quick, and easy way to handle all of their financial transactions, whether they’re at home, at work, or on the go. The continually changing financial services environment has moved up to encompass entire solutions to handle money from any location, from phone banking to internet banking, and now to mobile payment services. Mobile financial services are the way of the future, bridging the gap between banks and telecoms by combining mobile phone networks’ advanced platforms with secure financial systems. As a result, everybody who makes a payment using their mobile device expects complete protection and safety for each transaction.
Mobile payment has grown fast in recent years and will continue to do so in the coming years. MNOs (Mobile Network Operators), banks, solution providers, mobile terminal providers, and other third parties are all involved in the development of mobile financial services at the moment. Operators can build varied mobile payment services on one platform to make usage more easy and comfortable for subscribers while avoiding additional investment and problems in operating various platforms to save operators’ CAPEX and OPEX.
Subscribers can make credit card payments (consumer to a financial institution) immediately from their mobile phone at their leisure from either a bank account or a mobile wallet with this option (consumer to utility company or service provider). Payments made by retailers to wholesalers for the receipt of consumer goods, salary, commission, and pension disbursements made by companies and governments to individuals, and social benefit distributions from companies and governments to individuals could all benefit from mobile business-to-exchange.
Mobile business-to-exchange can fill the gap between direct deposits and mobile business-to-exchange in developing countries where the bulk of the population is unbanked.
All players, including mobile phone operators, payment system developers, and manufacturers, regulatory and standardizing agencies, and service providers, are now cooperating to make mobile payments a commercial success. They recognize that the market is gaining traction and has reached a ‘critical mass. The current mass testing of mobile payment technology has enhanced the likelihood of mobile payment’s implementation in additional areas and a higher growth rate in the future.
Benefits for Mobile Network Operators
• Improved brand image
• Additional recurring and consistent revenue stream
• Increased customer loyalty and trust Increase market share by providing clients with additional value-added interactive services.
Mobile Subscriber Benefits
• Eliminates the need to keep cash on hand
• The service is available whenever and wherever you need it
• Provides convenience through real-time, secure, paperless transactions
• The subscriber can pay for both items and services at any time and from any location
