Google Tez: How the payments app is different from Paytm, PhonePe

Google on Monday entered the Asian mobile payments fray with the launch of a new app in India called Tez, which means ‘fast’ in Hindi. It has also registered the trademark in Indonesia and the Philippines, suggesting that an expansion across Asia is imminent.

Tez rides on India’s government-backed unified payments interface (UPI) – hence it’s a huge endorsement of the public digital infrastructure that started rolling out in the country last year.

UPI enables instant mobile payments between multiple banks on a single app. It does away with the need to enter bank account details and codes or waiting for a beneficiary to be added.

On downloading it, Tez asked me to link one of my bank accounts. It then allows me to send money to anybody who has the app, whether it’s an acquaintance, a merchant, or a restaurant. The money gets debited directly from the bank, so there’s no need to transfer money to a wallet. All this took just a few minutes to set up, and I could transfer money instantly to a friend who downloaded it too.

UPI-enabled apps also do away with the need for card-swiping at retail outlets. India’s leading ecommerce site Flipkart uses UPI for its payments app PhonePe, and even the top digital wallet Paytm, which recently launched a payments bank, has a UPI payment option. WhatsApp too is expected to launch a UPI-based payments feature soon.

Google’s Tez also has a “cash mode” which lets the user transfer money to somebody nearby who also has the app, using the location service.

These are only the immediate uses of the app. Essentially, it can be used wherever UPI payments are enabled, including Google’s own music and video streaming services and other apps. The minimum payment on it is as low as Rs 50, so it enables micro-payments.