On eBay’s earnings call this past week, CEO John Donahoe revealed that the company’s Square competitor, PayPal Here, had landed its first U.S. retail deal. PayPal Here is now being sold at 1,800 AT&T stores across the US. Previously, PayPal only had an international retail deal in Japan with Softbank.
PayPal Here, which allows anyone to take credit card payments via both an app and dongle attached to a smartphone, is being sold at AT&T for $15, but you purchasers get $15 back with account sign-up.
It’s difficult to find out how much new usage comes from the sales of mobile payments devices like Square and PayPal from retail locations. But Square, which has been selling its payments product at retail outlets since the first half of 2011, has continued to expand its presence in retail stores over the past year. Square has doubled the amount of retail stores where it is sold, and is now in 20,000 outlets nationwide, including AT&T, Walgreens, Staples, FedEx Office, Apple, Wal-mart, Best Buy, RadioShack, and Target. In stores, Square sells for $10, with a $10 credit for purchasers.
On the call, Donahoe also addressed the reported reductions in headcount at PayPal, explaining that PayPal President David Marcus is taking nine different product organizations and streamlining this into one body. He said that any layoffs were not to due to cost reductions but the move has been about streamlining the business.
In addition, Donahoe revealed that PayPal is exploring merchant specific balances with its in-store payments product that has been implemented at Home Depot, Jamba Juice, and others. This means that the merchant can offer a specific balance if the consumer pays with PayPal. “2013 will be the year of test and learn with consumer balances,” Donahoe said.
All around, PayPal and eBay seem to be optimistic about the upcoming holiday shopping season, “We feel better going into this holiday than we have in a while,” Donahoe added.
PayPal is an online payments and money transfer service that allows you to send money via email, phone, text message or Skype. They offer products to both individuals and businesses alike, including online vendors, auction sites and corporate users. PayPal connects effortlessly to bank accounts and credit cards. PayPal Mobile is one of PayPal’s newest products. It allows you to send payments by text message or by using PayPal’s mobile browser. PayPal created the Gausebeck-Levchin test, which is an implementation...
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