Elisa, Fortumo launch direct carrier billing in Finland

Finnish mobile operator Elisa and the mobile payments company Fortumo are partnering for the launch of direct carrier billing. More than 2 million Elisa subscribers can now make purchases in app stores, inside games and for digital content by charging payments to their mobile phone bill.

“Nordic telcos are global frontrunners in mobile data provisioning and bringing new digital services to their subscribers. Carrier billing a is logical step to widen the choice of services to Elisa Finland customers. We are looking forward to working with Elisa in enabling carrier billing for leading digital merchants in Finland,” added Martin Koppel, CEO & Co-Founder of Fortumo.

While credit card ownership in Finland is relatively high, standing at 63%, carrier billing has become a popular payment method thanks to its simplicity and security. The main benefits of carrier billing over card-based payments are that the payments take only a few seconds to complete and do not require users to share personal data.

Thanks to this, an estimated 16.2% of all digital gaming transactions in Finland occur through carrier billing, according to SuperDataResearch. Additional information on carrier billing in Finland and neighbouring countries can be found from Fortumo’s Nordics market report. In recent news from the region, Fortumo announced the launch of carrier billing for the video streaming service Viaplay.

In order to provide carrier billing for its merchants, Fortumo has integrated with Elisa’s direct carrier billing API. This will enable digital merchants to collect payments through turnkey products both on websites and inside apps while also supporting more complex and advanced integrations through Fortumo’s Payments API. The latter is used by leading digital companies including Google Play and Spotify to enable mobile payments for their users.

Fortumo’s direct carrier billing platform is used by Google Play, Spotify, iflix, Sony, HOOQ, Gaana, EA Mobile, Gameloft, Kinguin and thousands of other digital content providers. One integration with the platform enables digital merchants to collect payments from subscribers of more than 350 mobile operators.