In the ongoing quest to make paying for things as seamless as possible, a new app just emerging from stealth mode is promising a whole new level of smooth.
Want to impress a date? Take him out to dinner, then when you're done, just get up and leave.
That's the apparent premise of Cover, which describes itself as "Uber's payment experience at restaurants."
When you ride in a car you've flagged with Uber, the Uber app already has your credit card information, which you've entered when you set up your account. When your ride is over, Uber automatically charges the fare to your card.
As reported by Bank Innovation, Cover appears to work much the same way, except you're paying a restaurant running the app on the backend instead of a limo. Presumably the restaurant keeps track of what you eat and drink during the meal and when you're done simply runs the total through Cover to charge your card. Meanwhile, you and your date walk out without you having to geek out on your phone, much less dirty your hands with a card or cash.
The idea behind Cover bears some similarity to Square's "pay with your name" feature. In Square's Wallet app, you can set up your account such that when you get close to a shop you frequent, your geo-aware phone "opens a tab," and your photo appears on the shop's Square-enabled register. Walk in and order; the cashier sees your face and charges you via Square. You've never taken a thing out of your pocket.
The experience enabled by both Cover and Square speaks to a certain high-minded design philosophy that the best technology gets out of the way to facilitate more direct human interactions.
Cover would appear to let you and your date do that by allowing you to leave for your movie without having to wait for a waiter to bring the check.
But there's also a more business-minded rationale behind seamless payments. Talk radio debt guru Dave Ramsey tells people looking to curb their spending to withdraw all the cash they've budgeted for the week out of the ATM at the beginning of the week and put it into envelopes. Once you run out of cash, no more spending for the week. Part of Ramsey's approach hinges on the emotional component of spending: You feel like you're spending more when you fork over cash. "There's something psychological about spending cash that hurts more than swiping a piece of plastic," Ramsey says.
Take that a step further to cutting out the physical act of spending entirely and imagine what happens. It feels like you're not even spending money at all. Which is exactly how just about any business wants you to feel.
Or as the folks behind Cover put it: "Customers spend more when they don't think about the check."
