Tuesday, April 8, 2014

PayPal Here Direct Payment Service App Gets A Major Facelift And Dynamic Search In 2.0 Update

PayPal's Here direct sale and money transfer service is an admirable rival to the similar Square, and before today its standard Android app was perfectly fine. But you can't deny that it looked a little... iPhoney. Thankfully the second release of the PayPal Here app brings the user interface more in line with other polished Android apps, and throws a little expanded functionality in for good measure.

The whole app has been simplified and streamlined, according to the change log, and customers should now be able to swipe their credit or debit cards at any time during the purchasing process. (You know, like the better kind of retail PIN pads.) The customer entry, profiles, inventory system, and logins have all been simplified and sped up. Sellers can now search through orders and purchases from the app, and the cart view screen will show customers more information than before.

Old screenshots for comparison.

The user interface is considerably flatter than before - in fact, it looks a lot like the mockups for Google's upcoming Hera system, in what's probably a bit of convergent design evolution. Text and images have been embiggened to give more emphasis, and the whole thing should be easier for sellers to select items quickly and for buyers to input their info at a glance. I imagine that when you're selling 1500 Glee Club brownies across a folding table, speed is of the essence.

PayPal Here is a free download for phones (not tablets), but you'll need the branded PayPal credit card reader to accept plastic.