Mobile payments are very fashionable and there are few who doubt that the immediate future already passes here, and a form of payment that is completely unknown here but that in other places like China is very popular is payment through messaging applications. Paying with the same application with which you send messages to your friends is already possible in Spain and another long list of countries thanks to Telegram, and we are going to tell you how it works.
With credit card or Apple Pay
Using the payment provider Stripe, Telegram has integrated into its application the possibility of making and receiving payments. Soon other providers will be used that will extend the availability of this function to India, Kenya or Russia among other countries in a long list. In any case, this is something that the user who is going to pay does not affect at all, since payments can be made by credit card or Apple Pay, without having to register on any other platform.
In order to pay another person or company, they will have to register in Telegram through a bot, using the API that they already have available. The customer, who is the one who makes the payment, only has to install Telegram 4.0 (or later) on his device, no further configuration is required. To make a payment you just have to click on the corresponding button and the window will appear in which you can choose the payment method. Credit card or Apple Pay are the options that Telegram currently includes.
As long as your Telegram account is protected with 2-Step Verification, you can save your credit card details, so you don't have to enter them every time you need them. Your credit card data does not reach Telegram or the seller, only the payment provider (currently only Stripe) has access to them. If you use Apple Pay you will not have to configure anything since it will automatically use the Apple payment system. Privacy in this case is guaranteed by iOS itself, since no one accesses your card details and the password required for payment is for a single use.
Using Apple Pay you will only have to place your fingerprint on the start button to authorize payment. Of course, the application allows you to select a credit card from among those that you have added to Apple's payment system, or usr the one that you have configured by default.
A promising future
At the moment this option for payments with Telegram has no practical use because there are no stores or services available that have already been added, but the possibilities are enormous. Imagine an online store, a website or even the neighborhood cafeteria allowing this type of payment, since once anyone is known they will be able, in a very simple way, to create their bot and accept payments. Even payments between people would be possible, although the fact that the seller has to pay a small commission for each operation will make this last option impractical for the moment. Cash will be a foreign object in the not too distant future.
