Paying
through SMS
Some information you might use
Paying through SMS is one way to pay for goods or services through a mobile phone. It’s easy to pay this way and everybody can learn it. Additionally, paying through SMS has advantages you won’t find in usual payment methods. Given that almost everyone owns a phone, it’s useful to have some basic information about this kind of payment. Who knows, you might use it someday.
Did you know ...There are multiple kinds of payment through SMS. Some of them have additional fees or paid carrier memberships. Operators have set financial payment limits when paying by SMS or flat rate. There is a single, monthly, and annual limit. The limit for one payment is 1200 Czech crowns for most carriers. The monthly limit varies.
SMS is an abbreviation of the term “Short Message Service”, essentially it’s a service that will allow you to communicate with others. They’ve been drastically displaced by apps through which you can send messages without any fees. SMS have a character limit and are charged.
If you commute by bus, you may have noticed the option of purchasing a 24 hour ticket by SMS. When you text a code to a certain number, within a few minutes, you have a valid ticket.
The option of paying through SMS is quite old. Most of us have come into contact with it for example, in games, where you could purchase game currency through SMS. Unfortunately, paying for games by SMS might cost more than paying by card.
If you’ve ever texted someone, you know it’s fairly easy to get the message content wrong. If that happens to you during payment, you should contact the carrier if the money has been deducted. What happens in most cases is that someone receives a meaningless SMS because they cannot receive money via SMS.
Shopping using SMS: what to watch out for.Most often, people buy travel tickets for transportation. The price of an all-day ticket is usually cheaper than buying multiple ones, plus it’s wonderful to have it on your phone as you cannot lose it. Most people keep their phones on them at all times. The same cannot be said about paper tickets, which can easily fall out of your pocket and when you have to present the ticket to an inspector, you won’t find it. What you have to be careful about when you pay for your ticket via SMS is that you cannot board the bus without receiving a confirmation message that you have actually purchased the ticket. If you’re caught, you’ll have to pay high fines. As we have already mentioned beforehand, another possible use of SMS payment is for game purchases. This option can be particularly attractive to children, as they don’t own bank accounts.
You might be surprised, but you can’t use SMS payments for everything. Their use is limited to tickets or gift coupons. What is interesting is that you can use SMS payment for a charitable contribution. However, you will most often encounter payment for digital media content. This means, for example, purchasing apps on Google pay or Apple store. You can also use credit to purchase extensions for already-purchased apps or to pay for a membership to an app.
What we are trying to say is that you won’t be able to buy a couch with credit. At least not in the European Union, where payment by credit is regulated.
If we were to summarize both payment methods, it is quite difficult to choose a clear winner. It depends on how you intend to use SMS payments. The main advantage is that there is no need to list your bank account number, which is very sensitive information. On the other hand, leaks of these sensitive numbers should not happen at all and even when they do, they’re rare. Unfortunately, the disadvantage of payment by SMS is the low limits. If you are buying more valuable digital goods, you probably won’t fit into the limit of 1200 Czech crowns. In that case, paying by bank account is more useful. After all, probably everyone has their bank’s application on their phone.
