‘You’ve got Dwolla!’– Cash transfer startup rolls out email option

Dwolla founder Ben Milne calls it “a workaround for a problem we’ve been trying to solve for a few years,” I’d call it another easy way to transfer money at a rate of $0.25 per transaction. Cash transfer startup Dwolla…



Video: Example of sending money via Dwolla using email option: Ben Milne sends $3 to my Dwolla account using my email address as the recipient. Screencast by Ben Milne. Dwolla founder Ben Milne calls it "a workaround for a problem we've been trying to solve for a few years," I'd call it another easy way to transfer money at a rate of $0.25 per transaction. Cash transfer startup Dwolla, who we reported on earlier today for making a hire from the banking industry and adding a Windows Phone 7 app to its arsenal, comes out with more news: they've added a fourth option for users to transfer cash. Starting today, in addition to sending or requesting cash directly from another Dwolla user using their Dwolla account number, or sending or requesting money from a contact of yours via Facebook or Twitter, the service now lets you enter an email address of a contact to send or request money (above, example of sending money to a contact via email, screenshot by Danny Schreiber). "We expect a mixed response from users," said Milne in an email interview yesterday. "There are thousands of people right now who are emailing us daily about paying landlords, paying water bills, parking tickets, or just their parents who aren't on Facebook yet. Now they can and it's really, really, really easy." As before, this matches up Dwolla even more so against the major player in the online payment space, PayPal, a service which operates around a user's email address. "We are really curious what happens when users just have the ability to pay whoever they want," said Milne. "These very vocal advocates now have the tool to just sort of… Go. Social Network or not." Also, as before, when sending or requesting money via Dwolla, the recipient on the other side does not need to have a Dwolla account. When the cash or request is received, they'll be prompted to sign up for an account. Here's an example of an email a non-Dwolla user would receive when a Dwolla user sends money to his or her email address:

This story is part of the AIM Archive

This story is part of the AIM Institute Archive on Silicon Prairie News. AIM gifted SPN to the Nebraska Journalism Trust in January 2023. Learn more about SPN's origin »

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