No waiting in queues in PayPal’s cash and card-free vision of the future

(PayPal)

PayPal is giving the world a sneak peek at its next-generation payment technologies and showing how it will compete against emerging digital payment solutions from credit card stalwarts MasterCard, Visa and American Express and mobile payment newcomers such as Google, Square, Jumio and Obopay.

While mobile payments feature heavily in PayPal’s forward-thinking solution, PayPal president Scott Thompson insists that "we’re not just shoving a credit card on a phone."

"PayPal is re-imagining money and making it work better for merchants and consumers – whatever device you’re on, wherever you are in the world, and however you prefer to pay (whether that’s cash, credit, or installments)," he says.

PayPal is investigating the use of geo-targeted mobile advertising that pops up when consumers walk by a shop, in-store barcode scanning, and flexible point-of-sale payment technology that lets people skip the queues when they pay electronically for their purchases and rewards them for doing so with loyalty points or rewards.

Additional in-store features would let consumers search other local stores for an item they’ve found in store that’s not currently available in their size. PayPal customers would also be able to change their mind about payment options (do I have enough money in my transaction account or should I put it on my credit card or pay for it in installments?) after they've checked out.  

Unlike Google or Square’s payment systems of the future that require users or merchants to have special terminals or NFC technology, PayPal’s solution doesn’t require any special equipment.

According to All Things D, Thompson said that "[w]e can’t be so bold or arrogant to think that you’ll adopt to the standards we've created. If we said throw away your terminals and get a new one, or buy a new phone … no one has that level of influence and pull."

In July PayPal predicted that wallets (as we know them today) will be obsolete by 2015 as consumers switch over to mobile payments.

PayPal has released a video showcasing "The Future of Shopping" which can be viewed here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V7q1jx8mYi8&feature=player_embedded.

You can view PayPal’s new products and services at the X.commerce Innovate Conference in San Francisco from October 12-13. Executives from companies such as eBay, Magento, Where, ShopSocially and Payvment will be at the conference to discuss their innovative payment solutions too.