Fonix partners with OMG to bring society lotteries into the 21st Century

 

22nd August 2018, London – Fonix, the mobile payments and messaging specialist, today announced that it has partnered with Open Mobile Global to provide a mobile operator billing mechanic for its clients that run society lotteries.

Fonix and OMG will be launching society lotteries that operate with a mobile payment mechanic for the very first time with The Alzheimer’s Society.

Society lotteries are run by charities, with the proceeds going to charitable causes. Traditionally, participants have entered into lotteries by purchasing a paper ticket, and this evolved over the years to encompass credit and debit card payments.

The Fonix and OMG partnership brings society lotteries into the 21st century and will allow consumers to enter these lotteries simply by sending an SMS to the service. This removes the need for entering banking details as only the mobile number is required to take the payment.

Simon King, Head of Product Development at OMG said of the partnership “We’ve worked with Fonix to deliver SMS donations for clients with great success, and since enabling society lotteries to use phone payment has been approved by the Payment Service Authority, it was a natural progression to collaborate with Fonix on this and add mobile payments to the mix.

We know there’s a demand for this sort of service, with some society lotteries having proceeds in excess of £250,000 in any one year. Introducing mobile payments will allow our clients to meet their fundraising goals more readily.”

Clare Charles, Account Director of Fonix comments, “We love making it easier for consumers to donate to charities, and society lotteries provide a really exciting opportunity for both OMG and Fonix.”

Mobile donations have been hugely popular amongst our charity clients and donors. As a payment mechanic, it’s easy, convenient and secure –  supporters can have absolute confidence in it. We can’t wait to see the results that running mobile operator billing amongst OMG’s client base for society lotteries brings.”

Review of the 070 number range

Ofcom has today published a draft statement on the regulation of telephone numbers beginning with 070, following a review of this market.

070 numbers are designed to be used as a ‘follow me’ service, where calls are diverted from one number to another, so the person being called can keep their own number private.

Ofcom has found that 070 numbers are often mistaken for mobile numbers, which can lead to bill shock, as the prices for calling these numbers are usually much higher than they are for calling a mobile number.

Ofcom have provisionally decided to set a cap on the wholesale termination charge for calls to 070 numbers, which would be aligned with the existing regulated cap set by Ofcom for mobile numbers – currently around 0.5 pence per minute.

16/8/18

Mobile Arts launches Direct Carrier Billing with SLA Digital

Mobile Arts, a technology provider in the Middle East, has partnered with SLA Digital to further grow their revenues with Direct Carrier Billing for their premium gaming and utility applications.

Direct Carrier Billing (DCB) is an alternative digital payment channel to traditional forms of payment like credit and debit card. The solution is seamless, secure and offers a user-friendly customer experience. Customers add transactions to their monthly mobile bill or deduct from their prepaid credit.

Ashley O’Kane, Head of Marketing at SLA Digital commented, “By leveraging Direct Carrier Billing, content providers like Mobile Arts are able to quickly and easily enter new markets and access a large pool of potential customers.”

Rabih Jreish, Business Development at Mobile Arts commented, “Having the right Direct Carrier Billing partner like SLA Digital, we can help merchants and content providers to quickly and easily start in-app subscriptions in new and existing markets. Our innovative solution, “APP-IT UP”, converts any content portal to a mobile application-based subscription product by integrating our smart SDK.”

SLA Digital continues to work with Mobile Arts on expanding its connectivity through SLA Digital’s portfolio of Mobile Operators across the Middle East and Asia.

For the full story please read their press release here:

A message from the Chairman of aimm

I hope that everyone is having a great summer both professionally and personally.

As some of you will already know, today sees our new GM, Joanna Cox, start her tenure with AIMM. I’m really pleased that we were able to get someone of her calibre to lead us through the changes we want to make to the way that AIMM operates in the next few months.

First, a few words about Joanna.

Joanna has a wealth of experience in our industry. She has worked in several companies in our sector, heading up client services at both Telecom Express and Spoke Interactive and also with Channel 5, controlling both the commercial partnerships and interactive services divisions. This included management of Big Brother PRS, social media and App voting. This experience of running services means that she has a great understanding of the opportunities and the challenges that our industry faces.

One of the first things that Joanna will be doing from today is to come round to our members and spend some time understanding how AIMM can help you. Whether by phone, in person or through a questionnaire, she will be reaching out to everyone in the AIMM family to understand how we can best serve the industry. We want to help our members find the opportunities in the market as well as navigate the threats it poses. I would ask that you spend the time to give her as much constructive feedback as you can.

This is the first step in our plan to ensure that AIMM is being truly representative of the whole of our membership and will allow us to collect the information we need to structure our activities. We want to ensure that we are being relevant to all of our members and that we are focusing on the issues that really matter and that will make a difference to you.

Our purpose at AIMM is to help our member companies grow their businesses. This means getting all parts of the value chain to recognize the size of the opportunity and creating an environment where services can launch quickly, be operated simply and be regulated fairly. That is what we intend to work towards and Joanna’s role will be integral to that challenge.

I hope you all join me in welcoming her to AIMM and I look forward to a bright future for our industry.

Kind regards

Neil Johnson

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