WhatsApp Payments could be launching very soon

The WhatsApp Payments system that will give users a quick, secure, and easy way to send money across the network has been “coming soon” for quite some time now. We first broke the story of the feature landing in the WhatsApp beta in 2017, but news of the feature then went quiet for almost 12 months. It wasn’t until May last year that we heard the feature was finally going to roll out to all WhatsApp users. Again though, we were met with nothing but radio silence on the issue and that has pretty much where we’ve been up to, until now.

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 WhatsApp Payments is now closer to a general release in India

A new report from Bloomberg says that Facebook is making slow progress towards launching WhatsApp Payments in India, but is about to reach a huge milestone.

According to the report, the long delay has been partly due to government regulations. WhatsApp needs to produce the results of an independent third-party audit that will show that all of the payments data involved in the new feature will be stored in India.

According to an anonymous source, WhatsApp is now preparing to submit this report to the Reserve Bank of India, which is India’s banking regulator. If the report receives approval, then WhatsApp Payments could finally be good to go.

The bureaucracy involved in setting up new financial services has caused the huge delays to the Facebook operation. There could be a lesson to learn for the social giant here as it pushes forward with the development of its own cryptocurrency called Libra.

The practical side of WhatsApp Payments has been wrapped up for quite some time now. Since last summer we’ve known that Payments will be backed by partnerships WhatsApp has made some of the leading banks in India including HDFC Bank, ICICI Bank, Axis Bank, and SBI.

The problem WhatsApp faces now, however, is that the long delay means WhatsApp Payments is moving into a crowded marketplace. Amazon Pay and India’s most popular digital payment platform, Paytm, have already complied with the Indian government’s regulations and so have a massive head start over the Facebook-owned messaging service.

What WhatsApp does have up its sleeve though, is a massive user base in India that is estimated at over 300 million active users. As with most digital services users will go for the payments service they trust and that is the easiest to use. If WhatsApp can establish payments as a simple and secure digital payment option there is a chance it could take off.

Unfortunately, there is no official news regarding a date for the rollout of WhatsApp Payments. The feature seems to be about to pass a very large obstacle, however, that has stood in its way for quite some time so maybe we’ll see it sooner rather than later. We’ve been here before though, so best not to hold your breath on this one.