The waistlines of Google Wallet customers may soon be expanding — along with the list of retailers accepting the payment system. Wallet users can now pay for donuts and takeout food, now that Dunkin' Donuts and Seamless have integrated the payment system into their Android apps.
Dunkin' and Seamless are joining other fast food merchants Papa John's, Dominos, Panda Express and Eat 24 on the platform. Google also announced that it has been integrated into Shopify after already adding merchant platforms ChowNow and Shopgate in November, allowing any businesses that use those services to provide Wallet as a checkout option.
The move announced in a blog post on April 9 is another sign that Google is ramping up its payment service in response to increased competition from the likes of Apple Pay. Google already bought Softcard, a payments rival owned by Verizon, T-Mobile and AT&T, in February. As part of that deal, the three mobile carriers agreed to preinstall Google Wallet on all of their U.S. devices starting later this year.
Apple Pay just added 10 new retailers to its ecosystem including T-Mobile, GameStop and Acme. That means it offers more retail options than Google Wallet — despite being a much newer service. Both systems are still dwarfed by PayPal, which controls 78 percent of the online money transfer market, according to a November report from ITG Market Research.
Apple Pay did, however, manage to capture 1 percent of the market in its first two months, whereas Google Wallet had only a 4 percent share nearly four years after its launch.
To date, the payment services of Google Wallet are restricted to U.S. users and businesses only, although the company has started extending the ability to transfer money – another aspect of Wallet – to international markets, opening it up to Gmail users in the U.K.
Apple's entry into the market appears to have reawakened Google Wallet. Rumors suggest a new Android Pay system may be introduced at Google I/O in May, its annual development conference.
