Tuesday, January 10, 2012
PayPal, Home Depot launch POS pilot
EBay Inc.'s payment arm, PayPal Inc., confirmed in a Jan. 9, 2012, blog post by its Director of Communications, Anuj Nayar, that it is launching a limited POS trial with The Home Depot U.S.A. Inc.
"It's true that The Home Depot is the first retailer to roll out a limited pilot program for our new POS technologies," Nayar wrote. "We frequently run trials with our retail partners. The Home Depot pilot is currently being run in five stores and involves a small number of PayPal employees."
Industry insiders speculated for months PayPay would soon introduce POS payment at a major U.S. retailer. Though the news of the trials may have just been confirmed, The Home Depot stores began offering the PayPal option in December 2011. The trial allows Home Depot employees to make purchases either using a PayPal-issued credit card or by entering a mobile phone number into a POS device at checkout. The test does not involve near field communication (NFC).
Some payments industry insiders expect PayPal will soon have more retailers in tow for its POS solution. Nayar was vague about future relationships, stating, "Stay tuned throughout the year as we continue to re-imagine money and make it work better for merchants and consumers – whatever device you're on, wherever you are in the world and however you prefer to pay."
This payment event arrives just a month after PayPal revealed it is testing NFC payment technology in Sweden, and it comes less than a week after PayPal President Scott Thompson left the company to become Chief Executive Officer at Yahoo! Inc.
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