Did you know that you can make PayPal payments using your cell phone? And I’m not talking here about a fancy-schmancy web-enabled phone, although that would allow you to simply surf on over to PayPal.com. Rather, I’m talking about a run-of-the-mill cell phone. Here’s the deal…
First off, you need to activate your phone. You can then send money to a friend’s phone number or e-mail address simply by sending a text message like this:
send 10 to 2025551414
or simply this:
10 2025551414
or maybe this:
send 10 to [email protected]
to 729725 (PAYPAL). PayPal will then call or text you to confirm your PIN.
Alternatively, you can call PayPal at 1-800-4PAYPAL (1-800-472-9725) to send money. Thus, you can take advantage of this even if your phone isn’t capable of texting.
Currently, the following U.S. carriers can handle PayPal Mobile for texting:
Alltel
Cinci Bell
Midwest Wireless
Sprint
T-Mobile (regular and pre-paid)
Verizon
Virgin Mobile
While I realize this has been around for a little while, I still thought it was worth mentioning. In fact, this sort of technology (if widely adopted) could revolutionize person-to-person transactions, as you’d be able to effectively pay individuals electronically while out and about.
Hi, do you need a Paypal account to send money? I mean if a customer want to pay me and I don’t have a smart phone to process credit card. I do have a Paypal account, but do my customer also need a Paypal account?
Thanks.
Does anyone know if it can be done from Portugal?
Danny, I think it would be great for craigslist transactions.
I was also thinking garage sales and the like, but that’s not necessarily a tech-savvy crowd.
I think this would be great for in-person transactions such as craigslist ads. You don’t have to carry around large amounts of cash. We’re slowly becoming a paperless society with cash.
Obopay allows you to make payments via cell phone text messaging as well (although, I just canceled my account with them because they threatened to increase the fees).
Just to add that you can do this in the UK too.
Neat trick, but I most likely will never use it. It won’t be at any point in the forseeable future, at any rate. Nice to know that it is available, though.