Google Introduces Wallet App on Sprint

Google Inc. has rolled out its mobile-payments application on Sprint Nextel, teaming up with Visa, Discover and American Express to make the service more widely available.

Google Wallet, which turns your smartphone into a sort of electronic checkbook, lets you pay for goods and services by tapping a smartphone on a small reader at checkout.  

The service currently works with Citi MasterCard but will spread quickly to others, Google is predicting.

Google says it has rolled out Google Wallet to all Sprint Nexus S 4G phones through an over-the-air update.  If that includes you, just look for the “Wallet” app. Here’s a demo of Google Wallet in action, provided by Google:

"Our goal is to make it possible for you to add all of your payment cards to Google Wallet, so you can say goodbye to even the biggest traditional wallets. In fact, we’ve got a video of our first customer, someone who is ready to replace his famously over-stuffed wallet. We hope Google Wallet gives him “serenity now,” Google said on its blog.

Then again ...

Of course, not everyone thinks this will take the world by storm.

"Consumers won’t save money by paying with a mobile phone. The same fees and interest rates for consumers and interchange fees for retailers will apply to mobile payments," said George Gombossy in his Connecticut Watchdog blog. "Retailers are also reluctant to spend the money to buy the equipment necessary to link your cell phone to their cash registers."

On the other hand, Christina Warren of Mashable has been using Google Wallet around New York City for the last six weeks with generally good results.

"Thanks to its partnership with Mastercard, the NFC chip built into the Nexus S 4G works with any of the thousands of PayPass merchants. This means that if you are in a taxi cab or at Walgreens, you can just tap or wave your phone to make your payment," Warren said.

Warren says that while the “tap and pay” method of payment is handy, the most potentially valuable feature is what Google is calling SingleTap. "The SingleTap experience means that users can combine their coupons, loyalty cards and payment method all with one tap," she said.

As an added enticement, Google is pairing its Google Offers (a Groupon-like deals program) with a loyalty rewards and purchase points programs tied to Google Wallet. Google says daily deals and coupons will be sent to people's inboxes. You can then use Google Wallet to skip pulling out the loyalty cards and coupons and instead just tap your phone in front of an NFC reader.

Predictably, not everyone is enthused. Privacy advocates say the Wallet will create a lifetime trail of transactions that can be mined by marketers and, potentially, the government. 

"Stores can user information about your Doritos purchases to rearrange their wares; Google could push coupons via its new Google Offers service; your health insurance company might be interested in your sodium intake," said a poster called jfruhlinger on Slashdot.