payments

Zynga and American Express have come up with a plan to combine physical and virtual commerce.

The companies today announced a program called Zynga Serve Rewards. The program allows FarmVille players to earn rewards after making purchases with a prepaid card from American Express.

In order to take advantage of the offer, users will need to jump through some hoops. To kick things off, FarmVille players will need to plant a Serve Money Tree on their farms. After doing so, they will need to register for Zynga Serve Rewards to receive the prepaid card in the mail. After adding money … Read more

Android owners are increasingly using their phones to make payments on the go.

Nearly 35 percent of Android users monitored by market research firm NPD in March were using mobile-payment apps, a rise of 8 percent since August. Among the people sampled, a larger number are using their phones to move money, buy products and services, comparison shop, and redeem coupons.

"Consumers are doing everything from basic utility (bill pay, moving money, and account management) to using the phone itself to pay for goods and services of limited value (micro-transactions), including buying a cup of coffee or movie tickets,&… Read more

NEW ORLEANS--Think there are too many digital wallets out there? MasterCard would disagree.

The No. 2 payments processor today unveiled PayPass Wallet Services, its own take on the digital wallet. Initially, it will pop up in the form of a payment icon at merchant Web sites. The wallet will allow users to store all of their cards, and MasterCard plans to distribute developer tools to allow other wallets to work with its network. The move is an attempt to broaden PayPass beyond contactless payments and into something more ubiquitous.

MasterCard is just the latest to be lured in by the … Read more

Square has once again hit the road to woo investors and raise some cash, according to a new report.

According to All Things Digital, citing unnamed sources, the payments company is attempting to raise new capital at valuation as high as $4 billion. The publication didn't say how much cash Square wants to raise, but if the ATD report is correct, the startup's valuation has skyrocketed in the last year.

Back in June, Square raised $100 million on a $1 billion valuation. In November, Virgin Group founder Richard Branson gave Square even more cash, though the company did … Read more

LOS ANGELES -- Like most people, I hate waiting in line.

But with all the advances in technology, we haven't really been able to get rid of the old-fashioned queue. From fun roller coasters to mundane drug stores, I often find myself wasting time standing in line. And it bugs me to no end.

So it was music to my ears when I heard that mobile startup PayDragon had a novel approach to mobile payments: one that focused on getting people out of lines and directly to their products.

In this case, PayDragon has worked with a few food … Read more

Tired of splitting checks when eating out? Venmo greatly simplifies making payments to your friends using your Android or iOS device, for free.

It originally began as a text-message-based payment startup, but Venmo has been gaining steady traction among smartphone users looking for payment utilities without the use of NFC chips and external card readers and sliders. The mobile app allows its users to send money to their contacts without the hassle of dealing with differing indivudal bank or credit card services. 

The result is a seamless and universally accessible payment experience that … Read more

Google has broken out its checkbook and signed off on a new deal to acquire payments processing provider TxVia in a bid to bolster its Wallet product, which has recently taken a PR battering.

Google Wallet represents the search giant's push into the physical payments space in a bid to replace the physical wallet with an NFC-powered Android smartphone. Google has teamed up with the payment industry's big end of town, including Citibank, Visa, and MasterCard for credit card payments. It also issues its own prepaid cards for those who prefer an alternative.

Google wrote on its Commerce blog … Read more

One of Google Wallet's co-founding engineers has left the Web giant for a job at mobile-payments processor Square.

Rob von Behren, who had worked at Google for more than eight years and on the NFC-based Google Wallet since 2009, recently changed his LinkedIn profile to indicate his new employment at Square. In an e-mail statement to NFC Times, which first noticed and reported the move, von Behren said the departure was unexpected.

"When I left the Google Wallet project in January, I fully expected to stop working in payments but to remain at Google," he told NFC … Read more

Links from Monday's episode of Loaded: