Amazon WebPay, a free online money-transfer service, is shutting down October 13, 2014. This means you’ll no longer be able to send, receive, or request money using just your email address and the Amazon Payments webpage.
There were hints back in June that the service would be going away soon. Amazon sent out an email this week to active Amazon Payments account users notifying them it is pulling the plug.
The user agreement has also been updated to note the elimination of person-to-person payments.
Once the transition is complete, the “Send Money” option will no longer appear after Amazon Payments customers log into their accounts.
“We are addressing a customer pain point particularly better than anyone else. We’ve learned a great deal about how and when customers want to send money and will look for ways to use these lessons in the future,” Amazon said about the shut down.
So far, Amazon doesn’t offer any alternatives, but that doesn’t mean that it may not look into introducing a new service in the years to come. So far, however, this seems to be the end of this road for this type of activity on Amazon’s platforms.
Transactions initiated prior to October 13 will not be affected, and recipients will also have 30 days to claim funds before the transaction is cancelled and funds are returned to the sender. Your transaction history will still be viewable at payments.amazon.com (sign in and click “Your Account”), though it’s not clear for how long.
