When Facebook Messenger was launched first launched in 2011 as an app on itself, Facebook was not that serious about it. As a matter of fact we could say they were testing the waters. However in 2014 they decided to turn it into a serious messaging platform. Since then its developers have worked to upgrade it and introduce feature that promotes it and make it more marketable. It is in these process of coming up with new ideas and developing more features that they came up with a feature that facilitates peer-to-peer payments a few months ago.
With the introduction of a peer-to-peer payments Facebook has added those who provide this service to its list of rivals. Examples of providers of peer-to-peer payment include PayPal Square and Venmo. The fact that Facebook Messenger is one of the most common messaging application and has over 540 million users means that this a heavy boost to the popularity of this feature and it might even surpass the already existing providers.
Through this new feature one is able to send money to friends and relatives in a digital manner. It also make it easy to send cash as you will no longer be required to access other applications to be able to send cash. The only application you require is Facebook Messenger. However there is a catch. One can only send money or receive it if only it has been withdrawn using either a Visa card or a Master debit card. For the cash transfer to be processed it is estimated to take about two to three days.
It is quite easy to use this new feature. The first thing one must do in order to use it, is link your Facebook account with either your Visa card or Master debit card. After you have done this a dollar sign appears just above the keyboard and you can use it to open this payment feature. After that you can carry out your transactions. Once you have hit the send button the cash first goes to Facebook who hold it for some seconds before they send it to the bank account of the recipient. If the recipient has not given a bank account Facebook holds the cash until he or she does so.
This feature also allows people to exchange money without incurring additional costs while using the application. As per the moment it only transfers money among friends and it has only been released in the United States of America but according to Facebook they will expand it and soon it will be international and even allow for business transactions to take place.
