- Google Pay now enables cross-border transactions.
- This service allows US users to send money to users in India and Singapore initially.
- The feature will soon be expanded worldwide with the help of Western Union and Wise.
Google Pay opens cross-border transactions for the first time. The move marks the Alphabet company’s entry into the remittance market.
According to TechCrunch, Google will initially open user-to-user payments between the US, India and Singapore. This means that Google Pay users in the US can send money to users in India and Singapore. The transaction does not work in the reverse order. Indian or Singaporean users cannot make international transfers to users in the US.
Google has partnered with Western Union and Wise to enable these cross-border Google Pay transactions. Both payment platforms will be integrated into the Google Pay app.
It’s also unclear whether these international transactions will be instant or whether it will take a few days to process. However, users can see the exact amount that recipients will receive.
Western Union confirmed in a statement TechCrunch that recipients pay no fees. You will also receive the exact value in your local currency as selected by the US sender.
In addition, Western Union is offering unlimited free transfers to Google Pay through June 16.
Wise, on the other hand, calculates the actual exchange rate and additional transfer fees. For payments up to $ 500, the first transfer is free for new customers.
Google does not charge any additional fees.
Finally, Google wants to expand cross-border transactions with Google Pay worldwide.
“As with a number of Google products, we’ll test, learn, iterate, and then start scaling,” said Josh Woodward, director of product management at Google TechCrunch.