Snapcash Review

By Author: Rayford Marks
Total Articles: 185
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Mobile money transfer is now deeply entrenched in different countries around the world and for good reason. Many people from across the world who hitherto had no access banking facilities for one reason or another now carry out financial transactions using their mobile phones and other devices. With low service fees charged by service providers, mobile money transfer has literally revolutionized the banking industry since a number of banks have entered into partnerships with such service providers, a partnership that now makes it easy for to open and operate a bank account using his/her mobile device without physically visiting a banking hall.
It appears as if the said revolution is still on course, at least going by what is happening globally. It is now simply enough to send and receive money on mobile devices. The emphasis is now on speed; how that money can be transferred from one mobile device to another and things are looking good. Snapchat has now made available a tool that makes it possible for its users to send money to their friends or clients using the popular messaging application. Dubbed Snapcash, it is a form ...
... of payment system that is similar in many respects to such other mobile payment systems as Venmo.
Snapchat offers the service in partnership with Square, an established financial and merchant services firm that also offers Squarecash, the other person-to-person money transfer service through e-mail. In order to use Snapcash, Snapchat users need to enter their information on Squarecash. In order to send money, a user types in the amount he/she wants to send in form of a private message. The application notes the amount indicated before displaying a green button that a user taps to complete and send the money instantly.

Announcement of Snapcash no doubt left many Snapchat users wondering how secure their personal and financial information will be. It must be noted that the announcement came after a number of high profile security breaches on Snapchat’s servers. For instance, Snapchat had to contend with serious allegations last January that its servers had been hacked and some 4 million user accounts compromised.
It was only last May that Snapchat had to enter into negotiations with US Federal Trade Commission in regard to allegations that it saved user data when it had informed its users that their data would not be stored. To allay security fears, Snapchat indicated that Square will be responsible for processing transactions made using it’s too. What this means is that Snapchat users using the tool to send money will literally be creating Squarecash accounts.
With about 100 million monthly active users, announcement of Snapcash serves as a clear indication that Snapchat is out to expand its operations beyond its messaging business. Although the service can only be accessed by US residents above 18 years, Snapchat’s large number of users should ensure the success of the service if they embrace it.