CalvinAyre.com’s Rebecca Liggero and txtNation co-founder Michael Whelan discuss the current state of mobile billing service in the European market.
Mobile billing services is a concept that is still trying to gain a foothold in the online gambling industry, but there are markets that have started to accept mobile payments as a better alternative to the traditional credit card billing.
Michael Whelan is the co-founder of B2B mobile billing options txtNation, believes customers today are more at ease in using their mobile phones to pay for products and services.
“[They’re] becoming more comfortable with it, especially in the Nordic countries where we do a lot of business. In the UK, it’s catching on as well,” Whelan told CalvinAyre.com.
TxtNation, Whelan said, is connected to at least 40 operators worldwide for billing and provides single-click payments in around eight to 10 of the markets, including Switzerland.
“[Switzerland,] it’s a no-brainer—high consumer spending power, everyone’s on a contract phone and they can bill for pretty much any content,” Whelan explained. “Beyond that as well, as lot of other markets have been working, [and] you can bill a higher amount of money, so you can bill £30, £40, £50 a year. Even in some markets…you can bill up to £100 on a single day per user. So those are the main reasons why we entered those markets, and also, beyond that, the payoffs are really high as well for the networks. You’re talking around 80, 85, even 90% plus. Sweden now is around 95% payoffs.”
In the UK, the limit for spending is around £30 per day, which, Whelan admitted, isn’t very much for the online gambling industry.
“It’s good for first time acquisition and deposits, of course,” Whelan noted. “£30 per user per day. With a prior permission, I believe you can go slightly higher than that, but for most services—nine out of 10—you are looking at about £30 a user per day.”
Still, Whelan believes pay-to-mobile billing is a strong tool for the online gambling industry.
“For the online gambling industry, it’s very important because you don’t have any forms to fill out,” he explained. “It takes away the impulse of using a credit card.”
