Billing on Mobile

There’s been a big change to the UK WAP billing standard, Payforit, with all UK subscribers now pre-checked for marketing opt-ins after a billing transaction. The marketing opt-in is presented to the consumer as a “check box” once a purchase is confirmed, and enables the consumer to receive relevant marketing messages, sent to their phone. It simulates the way consumers agree to receive email messages from companies whose goods or services they use on the PC internet. Of course, users can opt out but the fact that they are now pre-checked is a signicant change.

Previously, only users on Vodafone, 3 and T-Mobile were opted-in by default. When Bango tracked this change they found the numbers of people opted-in on Orange and O2 users (who were previously opted-out) increased from 9% to 51%.

Its certainly good for content providers as it will now make it much easier for them to market to their consumers. Will end users suffer from more SPAM? Quite likely…..

Getting the most out of this new feature is important. The latest version of Bango’s Payforit implemetation v2 is now live and features a real-time “web services” API that automatically notifies the content provider whenever there is a change to the opt-in status of a customer. This is whether through STOP command or other method. If a content provider acquires a marketing opt-in elsewhere in their site, and that user subsequently opts-out through the Payforit flow, the content provider is immediately notified.

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