A year after launch, British bank-backed person-to-person mobile payments service Paym says that it has processed nearly £44 million.
Launched under the Payments Council umbrella 12 months ago, Paym lets users make payments from within their financial institutions' app by simply using a mobile phone number as a proxy, without the need to disclose sort codes and account numbers.
With 16 banks and building societies signed up (Nationwide will join in May), the service covers 40 million UK current accounts, although only 2.25 million people have signed up, sending an average of £55 a transaction.
Meanwhile, a new survey suggests that mobile payments users are four times more likely to be happy sharing money with friends and family than the average Brit, and some 83% of Paym users think that sharing money is a sign of true friendship, compared to just 53% of all people.
Craig Tillotson, MD, Paym, says: "We’re using our mobiles more than ever - and not just for phone calls. When you add this trend to the wider growth in the sharing economy, mobile payments look set to be a real growth area over coming years."