Intuit Offers Merchants Free Mobile Card Procesing as it Expects Mobile Payment Growth

Seemingly in an effort to entice merchants away from mobile payments processing startup Square, Mountain View, Calif.-based financial software company Intuit Inc. is hoping to entice new users to its GoPayment mobile payment service by giving away free credit card reader and eliminating service fees for merchants who sign up for the service by mid-February.

By offering a free card reader and no monthly service fees, we want to give more small businesses a head start in the New Year by enabling them to take mobile payments without any upfront investment, said Chris Hylen, general manager of Intuits Payment Solutions division. And this is just the beginning. Well introduce new ways all year long to help more small businesses get paid quickly and inexpensively using their favorite mobile devices.

Intuit said that, since it launched its GoPayment service two years ago, the company has processed some $80 million in mobile payments with the platform. And the mobile payments market will only continue to grow.

We expect the point-of-sale mobile payments market in the U.S. to grow to $55 billion by 2015, up from an estimated $1 billion in 2010, said Gwenn Bzard of Aite Group. Intuit is among the best-positioned providers to lead that market, because of its existing presence in acquiring, its accounting and personal finance solutions, and its trusted brand.

Intuit processes more than $17 billion in transactions for about 300,000 small business annually. In addition to its Quicken and Quickbooks software, as well as its Turbo Tax service, Intuit is also known among consumers for its online personal financial management service, Mint.com.