Facebook Adds Group Payment Option To Messenger

As part of Facebook’s bid to become the next fintech giant, it recently added the option on Messenger to pay groups. This is meant to be an improvement on the previous system that the social media site had in place, which allowed for peer-to-peer money transfers. Basically, users can either pay everyone in a group chat or pay some of them be clicking on their names during the conversation.

Using the new feature is easy enough. When in a group chat, the users who want to pay members of the group or individuals within the group only needs to click on the plus sign at the bottom-left corner of the screen, Tech Crunch reports. From there, the users would need to click on the Payments command, which is a dollar sign with a white box and a bigger green circle as the background.

As for why anyone would want to use a service like this, Facebook is of the opinion that it can be used for things like chipping in for a gift to give a friend for their birthday. It could also be used to split the bill when eating in a restaurant. Sure, it would be a lot easier to pay in cash, but those currently abroad might find the service more convenient.

So, what does Facebook get out of introducing these kinds of payment systems? They get revenue, of course, but they are not getting it by taking a cut from the payments. Instead, Facebook will still be putting in some ads along with the payment system to get money that way, Recode reports.  

David Marcus is currently the head of Facebook’s Messenger App and considering his experience running a service like PayPal, everyone expected the retail aspect of the messaging service to blow. As it turns out, Marcus will be sticking to the proven method of collecting profit via ads like the social media site has always done.

“We’re not going to take cuts of payments,” Marcus said. “The one thing we traditionally do, and is a decent business for us, is advertising. So we’ll continue focusing on that.”