Snap's payment service, Snapcash, is shutting down
Snap is closing its peer-to-peer payment service, Snapcash. The feature, which is built into Snapchat, will shut down on August 30.
Eagle-eyed teen Ishan Agarwal spotted a deprecation message in the code of Snapchat's Android app, and the company later confirmed to TechCrunch that Snapcash is on borrowed time.
"Snapcash was our first product created in partnership with another company – Square," said a spokesperson. "We’re thankful for all the Snapchatters who used Snapcash for the last four years and for Square’s partnership!"
Tighten the purse strings
Snapcash launched in 2014, with a goal of making sending money "fast, fun and incredibly simple". Users registered a debit card using Square, then simply entered a dollar symbol in a chat, followed by an amount, to send cash to another person.
Unfortuantely for Snap, competition in peer-to-peer money sharing is tough, with apps including Apple Pay, Google Pay and Venmo all offering established services, and other social platforms like Facebook Messenger getting in on the act.
