A leak coming out of Re/Code today, shows us that Google is working on a new project that will let you receive and pay your bills through Gmail. Now many of us probably already receive bills through Gmail, but the new thing here is being able to pay them through Gmail. We are talking about actually paying your T-Mobile bill, your rent, etc., through the Gmail app without going to a third-party app or website. Making it seamless to pay your outstanding bills.
Right now it’s being called “Pony Express”. The documents in the report from Re/Code shows a setup asking the user for personal information. This includes such information like your name, address and social security number. This is provided to a third-party so it can verify your identity. Then depending on what bill it is, you may need to provide a credit card or account number as well. Once the user has been verified, the user can then receive and pay bills straight through Gmail, or even Inbox. Which is still in an invite-only phase. You can pay these bills with a debit card, credit card, or bank account. Your bills will be organized into a designated folder as well. To keep things nice and neat, and available in case you need to access them in the future.
It appears, from what we can see in Re/Code’s report, that Google is working with the companies that print and mail bills, instead of the service providers themselves. Now it’s completely possible that they could be working with both, this is just what we could see from the information provided in Re/Code’s report.
Google recently brought bill reminders to Google Now. Basically it scans your Gmail or Inbox to find bills that have been emailed to you. Finds the date they are due and adds them to Google Now. So you can quickly see when this bill is due, and how much you owe. A pretty small amount of data, but it can be really helpful. We could see this “Pony Express” feature debuted at Google I/O, or possibly next year.
