Looks like American Express will soon be joining the Passbook party very soon. AmEx integration won’t allow users to pay with Passbook, but will be centered around current promotions and recent purchases.
“The real-time notification capability allows AmEx to have a two-way dialogue with consumers that hasn’t really existed before. This creates a channel that AmEx could use for new features.
Some possible features could be:
- You’ll be able to see nearby offers from merchants based on your phone’s location.
- If a charge is flagged by AmEx fraud systems as suspicious, the network could send a real-time alert to the user’s registered phone number. The user could then enter a PIN to verify the transaction. Or, the transaction could automatically be verified by determining that the phone is in the same location as the merchant.
- Real-time restaurant reviews. Once a diner has dined and paid, the transaction alert could ask the user to review the restaurant.
- Real-time redemption of Membership Rewards points. When a transaction occurs, a notification could ask consumers if they wanted to pay with points instead of cash.
- For blind customers, transaction data could be spoken to them. This would allow them to verify the transaction amount.
Sounds like American Express has some innovative ideas on how to use Passbook. It will be interesting to see how other companies deem to use the app with their business models.
