Facebook launches “Facebook Pay” feature on its platforms

In a bid to increase customer trust and engagement, Facebook recently announced a number of changes to its platforms. The latest of these changes was announced earlier this week: Facebook will be launching its new payments system, named Facebook Pay.

Facebook Pay will allow users across all the company’s platforms – Facebook, Facebook Messenger, WhatsApp, and Instagram, to make payments to each other. It will initially be available to US customers only, and can be found in the “Settings” section of the apps.

The payment service will put the company in line with its competitors and will be similar to services such as Apple Pay, Square and Venmo. It will allow users to transfer money from their credit cards or bank account to pay for  “fundraisers, in-game purchases, event tickets, person-to-person payments on Messenger and purchases from select Pages and businesses on Facebook Marketplace.”

The company added, however, that this feature is completely separate to its cryptocurrency, Libra, which was announced in June and was due to launch next year. Facebook is still struggling to get this project running, with opposition from lawmakers causing issues.

Facebook recently lost several of its major partners in the Libra project, including PayPal, Visa and Mastercard. At a recent hearing, Mark Zuckerberg made attempts to address concerns from lawmakers that Libra, saying it would help users who don’t have bank accounts.

The launch of Facebook Pay will, according to Facebook, unify the company’s services and make it more convenient and accessible for its users. But this goes against concerns that the company is too large and should be broken up to encourage more competition in the market.

Deborah Liu, Facebook’s vice president of marketplace and commerce, said in a blog post, “Facebook Pay is built on existing financial infrastructure and partnerships, and is separate from the Calibra wallet which will run on the Libra network.”

“Over time, we plan to bring Facebook Pay to more people and places, including for use across Instagram and WhatsApp. We’ll continue to develop Facebook Pay and look for ways to make it even more valuable for people on our apps,”