Facebook Payments Doesn’t Compete With PayPal
Originally people thought that Facebook Payments would be a competitor to PayPal, however it is not, it’s merely a tool that helps you fill in your billing information automatically.
Here is a quote from the company explaining more about the service and what they are doing. This has sparked some debate about what the service could eventually be used for, since they would have the capability to compete with PayPal, but so far, it doesn’t look like they have the desire to get into the financial industry.
“We are working on a very small test that lets people populate their payment information already on file with Facebook into the checkout form of a mobile phone app when they are making a purchase. The app then processes and completes the payment. The test makes it easier and faster for people to make a purchase in a mobile app by simply pre-populating your payment information. It will be a very small test with 1-2 partners.
We continue to have a great relationship with PayPal, and this product is simply to test how we can help our app partners provide a more simple commerce experience. This test does not involve moving the payment processing away from an app’s current payments provider, such as PayPal.”