Even though a lot of consumers and financial institutions seemingly agree upon the power of P2P payment opportunities, ING has pulled the plug on their Twyp app. Despite the promise of completing peer-to-peer payment transactions with relative ease, Twyp never gained enough traction in The Netherlands. Is this the first sign of payment option fatigue setting in?
ING Pulls Plug ON Twyp Due To Little Traction
Mobile payment applications are not hard to come by these days. Virtually every bank has its own mobile offering, with most of them having multiple apps for different types of services. Rather than unifying these platforms into one robust offering, banks tend to spin off particular apps to see if they can gain traction.
For ING, one of the biggest banks in Belgium and The Netherlands, Twyp was one such experiment. The peer-to-peer payments app was created earlier in 2016, and targeted both markets in The Netherlands and Spain. Despite the lack of success in The Netherlands, Spanish users will still have access to Twyp in the future, where over 300,000 people regularly use the offering.
It is evident that the Spanish mobile banking sector is vastly different from the rest of Europe. Since most banking apps in Spain have far fewer features compared to their Dutch counterparts, it is not uncommon for consumers to rely on multiple mobile solutions offered by the same bank. Moreover, it appears that P2P payments have quickly become the new norm among Spanish consumers.
All Dutch users who still have money in their Twyp account balance should check their ING bank account in the coming days. All remaining funds should have been transferred to their bank account on November 24. Twyp accounts will remain active until December 15th, after which they will be blocked from the ING network entirely.
Dutch users provided ING bank with plenty of feedback regarding the Twyp app. Unfortunately, the feedback was not positive, as creating a separate app for peer-to-peer payments was not exciting enough to gain mainstream traction. Considering how the app was not linked to IBAN account numbers, there is very little use in picking up the app, let alone using it.
On the other hand, the ING Mobile Banking App seems to be well received by consumers all across The Netherlands. Moreover, the bank keeps adding new features to its main app, and it is not unlikely that Twyp functionality will eventually be integrated. Banks still have a lot to figure out when it comes to mobile financial applications, that much is certain.
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