Mobile Credit Cards Payments

Taking your credit card onto your mobile device is getting easier and easier, and shoppers around the world are beginning to think nothing of buying goods and services through their phones and tablets without having to take the plastic out of their wallets.

Advances in security mean that it is becoming far safer to store your card details on your device, just as long as you obey a few basic rules: Make the password unique and not easily guessed. And – of course- make sure that nobody else finds out your pass details, or you could find yourself in trouble.

Granted, the need for more complex and unique passwords comes with a risk of its own – people are back to writing passwords down in notebooks or on slips of paper in their wallets or purses, so the need for increased security is (ironically) having completely the opposite effect.

But there’s a new concept in town which might actually be a game-changer in the world of commerce, and it’s a Singapore company that’s investing big money into the credit card-related technology.

It’s called Square, and it’s a system that allows smaller merchants (such as market traders, smaller shops, cab drivers) to accept payments directly from your credit card to their mobile phone or tablet device.

Yes, that’s the complete opposite to what you’d expect, but it has the potential to make credit card use almost universal, wherever you may travel, and no matter how small the business.

Local capital wealth fund has poured what’s estimated as millions of dollars into Square, and is said to value the company at around S$6bn.

Square is a unique card reader that allows merchants to accept credit card payments straight to their phones by swiping the card through a special reader. Now, we all know that swipe card readers are on their way out (although they’re still used by some of the biggest corporations around the world), so Square will have to develop a reader at some time to accept chip cards.

Analysts tell Asiaone Business that Square needs to move quickly to get ahead in this technology, as it is facing fierce competition from Apple and Google, but it’s an intriguing move that takes the world of credit card use up to a new level.

We’ll watch with interest…