WhatsApp, the popular messaging service owned by Facebook Inc, begins offering its new digital payments service, partially starting in Brazil. It so happens that WhatsApp had been testing its new payments service in India for a long time, so it was expected that the start of its new service would officially begin in this market, but due to a series of regulatory difficulties, Facebook Inc. did not has finally been able to advance beyond its initial tests for a small group of users.
So, finally, the Brazilian market has been in charge of inaugurating the new digital payments function of the popular messaging service, which will allow both the safe sending of money between individuals, at no cost to both parties, and the payment for the purchase. of articles made in small local businesses without leaving the conversation, with a similar simplicity to sending messages.
In this sense, WhatsApp points out that paying for purchases will not cost users, although companies will be charged a rate of 3.99% on their sales for processing.
With the possibility of making payments for purchases on WhatsApp, a circle is completed in which companies have also been able to show the product catalog to their customers in the service itself for some time.
For the sending of money between individuals and the payments for the purchases of articles to be safe, WhatsApp requires the use of a special six-digit PIN, or the use of the fingerprint, measures with which it is sought to prevent unauthorized transactions .
For now, the new WhatsApp digital payment service, which will work under the Facebook Pay system, launched last year (in the tests carried out in India they used another system), it will be compatible with the credit and debit cards of Banco do Brasil , Nubank and Sicredi in the Visa and Mastercard networks, although the company is working to add the Brazilian payment processing platform Cielo to the equation as a further step for other new partners to be added later.
Although the service is being launched partially, WhatsApp hopes to be able to roll it out to all users in Brazil over time. In addition, the launch of the payment service on WhatsApp also paves the way for its deployment by the rest of the Facebook Inc. family of applications.
