Google Pay Will Now Work At Your Local Store: Here’s How It Works

Google Pay is another UPI-based mobile payment app used for digital transactions in India among other countries.

Google Pay users will now be able to use their mobile-centric payment app across local stores in the country. The search giant’s payment product has joined hands with Singapore-based payment terminal company Pine Labs, which is already offering its point of sales terminals to over 300,000 offline stories in more than 3,000 towns in the country.

This is a big game changer for Google Pay, which until now has relied on mobile connectivity and limited support for vendors to appeal to users for making payments. Pine Labs will offers its existing offline support, enabling users with Google Pay to pay without using cash or taking out their physical cards.

Paytm and Samsung Pay are some of the existing payment providers working extensively with offline stores and even though Google Pay has similar support, this partnership will enhance its reach multi-fold.

But the use of mobile apps for digital payment does come with a catch and Google Pay’s method of working at these point-of-sales terminal is no different.

Merchants can initiate a payment request using a Google Pay user’s mobile number. The user then authenticates this request via their Google Pay app for the payment to be processed. Both the merchant and customer receive instant notifications on the completion of a transaction.

Pine Labs 

Basically, what the company is saying users with Google Pay can make offline transactions, but for that they’ll have to share their 10-digit mobile number. After all this is the premise on which Google Pay (based on UPI) works.

The merchant will send a payment request to the person’s mobile number, which can be authenticated via the Google Pay app. The payment is processed when the user puts in his/her four digit UPI PIN.

The latest digital payment reports suggest that UPI is becoming the go-to mode for consumers in the country, with Paytm leading the charts, followed by PhonePe then Google Pay.

QR-code payment is another widely available feature in the country. But POS terminal based payments are likely to find more takers, that is, if they are okay with sharing their mobile number with the store clerk.