Facebook plans to provide in-store purchases through its Messenger, ranging from online shopping and customer service to multiplayer mobile games.

Reports said that the social network giant formed a team dedicated on the project that will allow the users to purchase stuff in retail store using the Facebook Messenger app that will authorize the credit card transaction. Specifically, the app will allow customers to pay personally or pay directly in Messenger when they pick up the item they ordered.

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The Facebook’s Messenger app for iOS has two potential features. The first feature is the in-store payment, which appears like Apple Pay and Samsung Pay. Users can also send and receive money to and from friends. The second feature is called Secret Conversations. It can be an encrypted chats feature, or something less substantial like the ability to hide a conversation on a device. Adding an encrypted feature could be a good idea and not entirely a surprising move considering the increased attention encryption has received and the growing consumer concern about privacy.

Facebook Chief Executive Mark Zuckerberg said in January that there’s a possibility that the company could forge partnerships with the likes of Apple to facilitate a payments service. The popular social networkings site is interested in creating a system that makes it easy for users to interact with businesses, which would enable the social networking giant to potentially charge more money for ad space.

“We'll partner with everyone who does payments. We look at the stuff that Apple is doing with Apple Pay, for example, as a really neat innovation in the space that takes a lot of friction out of transactions as well,” Zuckerberg said.

The retailers will allow then shoppers to buy products from within the messenger app. Currently, a number of retailers such as Everlane and Zulily are using Messenger for handling customer service around orders, but not paying for actual purchases just yet

TagsFacebook Messenger, in-store payment, apple pay, Secret conversation, Facebook