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Canada Telecoms Launch Mobile Payment Service

Posted by ScuttleMonkey on from the can-i-request-money-all-day dept.

GregDz11 writes to inform us that Canada's three main wireless companies will be launching a service that allows customers to send, request, and receive money via their mobile phones. "The service, called Zoompass, will be managed by Enstream, a joint venture the three carriers first established in 2005, when it was called Wireless Payment Services, to investigate the potential of mobile commerce. [...] Money can be drawn from an account the user sets up or from their credit card. Each withdrawal will cost 50 cents from the account, or 3.5 per cent of the transaction if from a credit card. (As a result, sending dollar amounts under $15 are actually cheaper to do using a credit card.)"

6 of 107 comments (clear)

  1. Re:mobile is where it's at by rs79 · · Score: 4, Interesting

    As if there needs to be another way to sink (lots of) money into the black hole that are commercial celphones. I'm still trying to figure out how to actually get Telus' "$15/mo unlimted text messages" to actually only cost $15/mo.

    Android/wifi/skype pls hrrythfckup.

    R
    While my guitar gently weeps.

    --
    Need Mercedes parts ?
  2. Overpriced by Bradmont · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Why would you pay $.50 to use this when transactions on credit cards and (some) debit cards are free?

    1. Re:Overpriced by Chirs · · Score: 4, Informative

      You're getting hosed.

      I use president's choice financial. Interac usage is free, as is the use of any CIBC bank machine (including the little ones in 7-11 stores). There is still a charge to take out cash from bank machines not owned by CIBC.

  3. 40 cents too much by shking · · Score: 4, Interesting

    If they're hoping to take over a significant share of transactions between private individuals (aka "consumers"), they're in for a rude shock. The service is grossly overpriced. Cash is free and most people get a certain number of free cheques / free withdrawls on their bank plans. Ten cents a transaction *might* be cheap enough

    --
    -- "At Microsoft, quality is job 1.1" -- PC Magazine, Nov. 1994
  4. Trust issues... by greed · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I'm having trouble thinking of an organization I trust less than Canada's telecoms companies to handle my money.

    Has Bell figured out how to deal with incorrect direct payment transactions? When it happened to me, I had to have my bank block all transactions originated from Bell. Bell couldn't figure out how to identify the account making the bad transactions on their own--they actually needed the "payment refused" bounces from the bank. (They've got check-digits on account numbers now, but can they fix a problem from their end yet?)

    A friend on Roger's discovered his phone had been cloned. The Roger's people thought that there was nothing odd about his phone being used in Toronto and in south Florida at the very same time. (The small claims judge did think that was odd.)

  5. mobile wallet by Bradmont · · Score: 5, Funny

    FTA:

    The venture is the first tentative step toward a true mobile wallet

    My wallet has been mobile for years already...