Circle Pay - Review 2022

Circle Pay, backed by financial powerhouse Goldman Sachs and other major investors, is a Venmo competitor with a few distinguishing characteristics. Like Apple Pay and some other payment apps, it uses a messaging interface for your transactions. But dissimilar Venmo and most others, it does permit you send money internationally, though not to as broad a pick of countries equally Xoom or PayPal. Another benefit is that y'all don't pay whatever fees to have money quickly dumped into your bank business relationship. But forget about paying in stores or on websites, or taking advantage of loyalty programs, or paying with your voice. For those features, consider apps like Apple Pay, Venmo, or Samsung Pay.

Pricing and Starting Up

Circle Pay is free on both mobile app stores, and is a reasonably small download for both Android and iOS. I installed Circle on an iPhone X and a Samsung Milky way S6. On Android, y'all have to allow privacy access to your identity, contacts, SMS, photos, and camera. The setup process is very clear and well designed. You tin can sign upwardly simply, using your Facebook business relationship, or you can create an account with an email accost. After this, the app asks to find your friends by accessing your Contacts. Next it asks permission to send yous notifications.

For me, the next step was verifying myself by having the app send a text bulletin from my phone to Circle. It wouldn't be of much use if y'all didn't connect it to your banking company, which is next. You lot tin can do and so by entering your Debit Card number with a keypad, but tapping a photographic camera icon simplifies this procedure by letting you take a picture of the card instead. Notation that Circle doesn't accept credit cards, only debit cards; this lets the service stay costless, as transactions using credit cards invariably come with fees. I entered my CVV number and ZIP code, and, voilà: The app was ready to pay!

Using Circle to Pay and Request Moolah

The app's interface is pleasingly designed. It has three main modes, accessed by choices all the way at the superlative: Ship, Letters, and Request. The start and last simply display a big numeric keypad. Messages mode is where you see your account activity and details. 5 icons atop this mode—New, Banks, Transactions, Friends, and Settings—give access to everything you need. The New button just takes you to the same numeric keypad screen. The Banks selection lets you either add coin to your Circle account or greenbacks money out to your actual bank.

Dissimilar Venmo, Circumvolve doesn't force you to add a annotate for each payment, though it is an choice. Like Venmo, Circle tries to gamify payments with emoji and animated GIFs in the chat interface used between yous and the contact you're paying or receiving money from. It doesn't create a social network where all you friends can see your payments, as Venmo does; that could be a plus or a minus, depending on your perspective. Unlike Foursquare, Venmo, PayPal, and Apple Pay, Circle doesn't pop upwards when you lot tell Siri to pay someone $v. You can utilise Face ID or Touch ID to OK payments, all the same.

My initial payment limit was $400 per week, which is in the ballpark of Venmo and Square Cash, which get-go y'all out with a limit of $300 and $250 per calendar week, respectively. That's less than Google Pay's $10,000 weekly limit. Well-nigh payment services let you build up your limits as you go on to use them reliably, and Circle is no different. You can even request to bump up your limit in exchange for inbound details such equally your social security number.

One of the best things most Circle is how fast y'all can become money into your bank business relationship, and with no fee. When I made a test payment, the coin was in my friend's checking account inside minutes. Zelle is similarly fast—unless the recipient hasn't enrolled in that service, in which case it takes 1 to 3 days. Yous do need to hit Cash Out with Circumvolve to go the money into your bank business relationship; it doesn't menstruation there automatically. Square Cash offers an auto-cash-out feature, just for that you lot'll pay a 1 percent fee. Venmo charges 25 cents for expedited money transfers to your banking company.

International Payments

Circle bests many person-to-person payment apps in that information technology offers international payments. The visitor claims information technology doesn't mark up substitution rates, either. That's the good. The bad? It only supports two strange currencies, Euros and British Pounds. That's a far weep from Xoom's 66 supported currencies and PayPal's 24. Xoom has the added benefit of non requiring the recipient to take a Xoom account: They can just caput to a local bank and pick up greenbacks after showing a code and an ID. Circle's advantage over the others is its lack of fees and improve exchange rates.

Extra Money Features

Aside from its conversation GIFs and international payments, Circumvolve is curt on extras. Yous won't find support for store loyalty programs like you go with LevelUp and PayPal, and yous can't use it to pay in-store or online. There's no equivalent of the PayPal'south Coin Pools for collecting from multiple parties. Many payment apps, including Zelle, permit you separate a nib among multiple people, just this feature is nowhere to be constitute in Circle. Nor does Circle back up Bitcoin, as Square Cash does, though the visitor is at work on another app that does: Circle Invest.

I actress goody worth mentioning is Circle's referral programme. If y'all invite someone to sign up, you get $five when they pay someone $25 or more. That's free money, people!

Security and Privacy

Like Apple Pay Cash, Circumvolve requires two-factor authentication, then if you lot or (more chiefly) someone else tries to log into your account from a new device or browser, you need to verify with a code sent to your mobile telephone. The service uses two levels of AES 128-flake symmetric encryption, too equally AI techniques to suss out fishy activeness. It besides supports Impact ID/Face up ID on the iPhone. By comparison, Venmo doesn't specify what blazon of encryption it uses on its security FAQ page, though it does enforce 2-factor authentication when you endeavor to sign into your account on a new device.

All services that deal in bank cards must, however, comply with PCI-DSS, a security standard used by financial institutions, and so in that location'due south some level of protection in that location. Venmo, Square, PayPal, and Circle all boast a score of A+ on SSL Labs SSL/TSL test, which is based on document validity, protocol support, key commutation, zilch forcefulness, and vulnerability to SSL threats like Heartbleed and Animal.

Circle or Square?

The all-time things nigh Circumvolve Pay are that it immediately transfers money into your banking concern account without a fee such as Venmo and Square accuse, that it can pay in Euros and Pounds without a fee, and that you get $five for referring friends. Otherwise, at that place'south not much to distinguish it from Venmo, Foursquare Cash, or PayPal, and all of those offer benefits not found in Circumvolve, like the ability to pay in stores and utilize loyalty programs. For a more than well-rounded payment app, check out our Editors' Choice, Venmo.

Source: https://sea.pcmag.com/software/20013/circle-pay

Posted by: overlyalifeen.blogspot.com

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