How to use Google Pay to make payments over the phone

If you’re tired of keeping track of your wallet or sifting through it to find the right card, or maybe you’ve realized in the payline that you forgot your wallet at home one too many times. , Google Pay might be a better option for you.

Google Pay is a secure way to manage your cards, send money to friends, pay bills and pay for groceries at checkout. Setup is simple, and there are plenty of ways to leverage your digital wallet on your Android phone. So let’s see how to use Google Pay.

What is Google Pay?

In its simplest form, Google Pay is a wallet where you store your cards. However, he is capable of much more than that. With Google Pay, you can use your Android phone to coordinate group payments and track your expenses.

Once logged into the app with your Google account, you can add cards or link your bank. Once your Google Pay account has access to the funds, you can open the app in a checkout and tap the card reader to pay with any of the cards in your Google Pay wallet.

How does Google Pay work?

Rather than having to manually enter specific cards when checking out on a website, Google Pay will let you choose from your payment options at will, and means you don’t have to store them all on websites. themselves.

When you use your phone at a checkout, your designated default card will be used. When prompted to insert your payment method, simply touch your phone to the terminal. Using NFC (Near Field Communication), the terminal will request payment information from your phone and Google Pay will provide your phone with the selected payment method.

It’s like swiping your card or scanning a chip, only that data is transmitted from your phone rather than the card.

How to set up Google Pay on Android

Setting up Google Pay on an Android device is extremely easy. However, there are actually two versions of Google Pay, and which one you use depends on your country of residence.

The new Google Pay app

The latest version of Google Pay was launched in March 2021 and at the time of writing it is only available in the US, India and Singapore. On most devices, you’ll need to download the app separately. This might leave you with two Pay app icons on older phones that already had the old app pre-installed. You can disable the old version of the app to hide it.

For this guide, we’ll be setting up the new app, although the basic instructions are similar for the old app as well.

To download: Google Pay (free)

The old Google Pay app

In other countries, you may have the older version of Google Pay, which is a simple card manager that you can use to pay online or in-store. This app is often pre-installed on Android devices, especially Google devices, like the Pixel series. Google has provided a list of all countries that support Google Pay.

If this version still works where you are, update it in the Store or download it if you don’t already have it.

To download: Google Pay (free)

Install the new Google Pay

Let’s review the installation process now. Next, we’ll talk about what you can do with Google Pay as well as some unique features you may have enabled during setup.

1. Upon opening the app, you will be prompted to sign in to your Google account and provide your phone number. This is required to set up your phone as a Google Pay device.
2. The next step is a set of privacy preferences. You can choose to enable these features now, but they are not required and you can always change them later from the settings menu. These settings include: allowing friends to find you, opting in for cash rewards, and sharing activity data with Google. We will discuss this in detail below.

After configuring your privacy settings, you will be prompted to set up contactless payment. You don’t have to do this now, but to do this, just tap the prompt at the top of your screen and enter your card details. This card will be used when paying in store.

Google Pay Privacy

Just before entering your card details for contactless payment, you were asked to choose three privacy preferences. Whether you signed up or not, you need to know what they do and how they benefit you.

• First, you were asked if you wanted to let your friends find you. If you’ve enabled it, your friends and contacts have likely been alerted to your Google Pay account creation, if they’re also on the app. It just makes it easier for them to connect with you on the app. When notified, they don’t have to hunt you down to split your lunch bill or send you the five bucks they owe you. They just have to tap on their notification to connect with you instantly.
• Next are the cashback rewards. To be eligible for this, Google Pay must collect information about your payments. This information relates to the third parties involved, such as your card-issuing bank, and the businesses where you spend money, to provide you with cashback opportunities at your favorite stores.
• Finally, Google wanted to know if you would share data with them. By recording this data, they essentially personalize your experience. They will take into account where you shop, the type of card you use and your location to provide you with personalized offers. This data will not be used for other Google services.

All of these options are designed to optimize your experience. They are intended to make it easier to connect with friends while providing you with offers and cashback opportunities based on your spending habits.

If you’re worried about security and privacy, or want to learn more about transaction thoroughness and in-app data collection, there are a few good reasons why Google Pay is safe.

How to use Google Pay

Now that you’re signed in and ready to start using Google Pay, it’s time to add some payment methods. Then you can use GPay to pay in-store and online.

Add cards and use NFC

Adding cards and scrolling through your wallet are extremely similar in both versions of the Google Pay app.

1. To add cards to your Google Pay wallet, tap the prompt at the top of the screen in the app’s main menu. It should be said Configure contactless paymentor you can press the Pay contactless icon instead.
2. Press now Add a map to manually enter your card details or take a picture of your card. Once your first card is added, this will be your default card. If you add more than one map, you will have to choose the one you prefer by default.
3. You are ready to scan your phone at checkouts using NFC.

Swiping left or right from your home page will show you your offers and spending activities respectively. You can track cash back and rebates this way, as well as find out where and how you spend your money.

Pay online with Google Pay

Using Google Pay online is just as easy, as long as the website you’re on supports it. When you access the shopping cart on the website you are browsing, the checkout button may be accompanied by other payment methods – PayPal and Google Pay are among the most common. Just tap this button and a GPay overlay will appear.

This will show you the default email, address, and card (which you can change here) for your Google Pay account. All you have to do is type Pay to confirm, and the transaction will be processed.

Other Google Pay features

Some other features at your disposal include Relationships, where Google Pay focuses on the people and businesses you interact with most regularly. There are also, as we mentioned, the cashback offers. We’ve already discussed the focus on relationship-based tracking, as well as some ways Google Pay intends to save you money.

Another feature of the new version of Google Pay is the ability to create a group bill with friends. This will take a bill and split it among party members, and it will keep track of who has paid their share until the total is reached.

Use Google Pay on Android

Now that your Google Pay Wallet is home to all your cards, you can quickly pay online and in-store with the push of a button. Are you excited to take advantage of this ease of access? Are you forgetting your wallet more often thanks to Google Pay? If you’re interested in another smart payment method, check out our guide to setting up Samsung Pay on your Android device.

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