Christian Solomine explains to Rebecca Liggero how PayNearMe is different from other alternative payment methods available today.
There is always space for alternative payment mechanisms, particularly in the online gambling sector.
Players have the traditional option of pulling money from their bank accounts or using credit cards to fund their online accounts, but the problem is that a lot of people experience credit card rejections, and there are those who want to keep their online gambling spending separate from their regular budget. Their solution: alternative payment methods like PayNearMe.
Christian Solomine, VP and GM of gaming at PayNearMe, said this method makes use of retail locations to allow players to use cash as an alternative to traditional banking for online play.
“We have created a cash transaction network and, in the case of New Jersey and Nevada, works at 7-11 to allow players to go register with the site and then go to a physical store, give the clerk cash, scan a barcode, and by the time they’re back in their car, their account has been funded with cash,” he told CalvinAyre.com.
Currently, there have been a lot of issues with using credit cards for online play, but credit card companies are already trying to alleviate some of these problems by changing their coding. Solomine believes this is good news because it will “rise the tide” for all payment methods.
“I think some people who previously had credit card rejections will now go use their credit cards, but on the same note, when you have more players, you have better liquidity, and when you have better liquidity, the games are more interesting, more people [will] want to join, so I think it will rise the tide for all the different methods,” he explained.
Solomine said they are already getting requests from ancillary type of gaming sites such as daily fantasy sports, where a lot of players still prefer to use cash despite the sites having good credit card acceptance rates.
“There’s a lot of players that prefer to use cash, whether they want to use it because they want to get paid in cash, whether they want to use it because they want to keep their spending private or they just want to use it for budgeting purposes. A lot of people like to keep their spending for online play separate from their bank account or their credit card where they pay their regular daily bills,” Solomine noted. “Those are some of the other reasons why people like to use alternative payment mechanisms.”
