Will apps of the future make cash redundant? 

If you’ve ever paid for a purchase in store with Apple Pay, or split a restaurant bill with a group of friends and then used an app to send cash to pay for your share, you may well be part of a future movement in which apps make cash redundant.

As someone who has taken up, or is thinking of taking up, the Eazi-Apps app development business opportunity, it pays to have your finger on the pulse of all app-related trends. One of those trends is most definitely the rise of person-to-person payment apps.

What are person-to-person (P2P) payment apps?

A person-to-person payment apps is, as the name suggests, an app which makes it easy for you to send cash to another person. Think of this like the 21st Century version of the bank transfer. In previous decades, if you owed money to someone you’d write them a cheque, give them cash or commonly, carry out a bank transfer. To do that, you’d need to know the other person’s bank account details then go into a branch or later, log into online banking to transfer the money across. It’s time consuming and can be frustrating.

Person-to-person payment apps remove all of that fuss. Simply log into your app of choice and within a second or two you can send money to another person quickly and effortlessly.

Do P2P apps exist already?

Although this is a relatively new area, there are a growing number of person-to-person apps available and they are rapidly gathering users. PayPal is a familiar example but there are already a number of other popular services including Venmo (which is owned by PayPal), Square Cash, Apple Pay and Zelle. Even Facebook has got in on the act with the addition of this functionality via Facebook Messenger.

Why are they growing in popularity?

P2P apps are quick, hassle free and convenient and they feed directly into the enduring popularity of mobile devices for everything from search to shopping, travel planning to navigating.

As we have already seen, person to person apps are super quick and easy to use once set up and make light work of paying someone back if you owe for a shared meal, household bills or a loan from a friend. As well as being cashless and useful for making smaller everyday payments, they can also be used for sending larger amounts.

P2P payment apps remove the need to carry cash, mean you don’t have to struggle to find a cash point on a night out, don’t require the fuss of making a bank transfer the traditional way and the transaction can be completed in just a few taps.