PayPal.Me caters to small merchants

PayPal.Me is a new payment platform suitable for small merchants. They can set up their own user profiles that are associated with a personalised URL.
The social-commerce merchant can place a link for PayPal.Me on social media such as Facebook for customers to pay.
Rahul Shinghal, general manager of PayPal Southeast Asia, said yesterday that social commerce was an exciting segment for PayPal and Thailand showed the fastest growth in Southeast Asia.
PayPal is a global payment revolution to help build trust between small sellers and buyers, he said.
The barrier between small merchants and buyers is trust. If those small merchants use PayPal as their payment system, their businesses will have an opportunity to grow.
The company could not give a figure on the growth rate in Thailand, under company policy, but about 10,000 merchants in Thailand applying for membership in PayPal are small merchants.
Globally, PayPal had 188 million active customer accounts, which the company defined as having been used every month.
 Shinghal said travel, gems and jewellery, and fashion were the three focus segments of PayPal in Thailand.
A study by PayPal shows that the travel business in Thailand is not embracing mobile opportunities.
However, Thai travel businesses have moved faster than many countries in the region to embrace opportunities that have arisen from the increase in mobile usage.
In the Asia-Pacific region, computers remain the top devices used for online travel booking, but mobile devices also account for a significant proportion.
From a survey, 71 per cent of Thai businesses confirmed that they had a mobile presence.
Only 50 per cent of businesses in Singapore and 54 per cent in Malaysia offer mobile-friendly services to customers. The digital traveller is demanding simplicity, convenience and trust when making travel arrangements and mobile is the way to go, Shinghal said.
If businesses can offer a simple and secure payment experience, PayPal is focused on helping the travel businesses in Thailand to tap the global opportunity, he said.
Last year, 28 per cent of the 4.9 billion payments processed by PayPal were made on mobile devices.
The National E-Payment Project in Thailand, which allows money transfers free of charge for the first Bt5,000, does not affect PayPal because it deals in cross-border payments, while the policy has the objective of encouraging cashless payment within Thailand.