A report by The Wall Street Journal on Wednesday says Apple is in discussions with U.S. banks to create a person-to-person payments service possibly using Apple Pay. The service would allow users to send payments to each other, ala PayPal’s Venmo, or the Square Cash service.
While little is known about the proposed service, communications between Apple and the banks is said to be ongoing, although it isn’t known if any deals are as yet solidly in place. Apple is reportedly in talks with Chase, Capital One, Wells Fargo, and U.S. Bank, but a number of details still need to be worked out.
The report doesn’t provide details about how Apple might make money from the service, perhaps using it as a lure to bring more users into the iPhone/Apple Pay fold. Apple is said to be offering the service free to banks. Apple currently charges a small transaction fee to banks for each Apple Pay transaction.
Person-to-Person payment services are usually used for personal payments, such as paying a share of the rent, or splitting a dinner tab when one user doesn’t have cash on hand.
No debut date has been announced for the service, although the report indicates Apple is looking at a 2016 timeframe.
