Amazon unveils sms shopping

AS IF ONLINE SHOPPING hasn't made it easy enough for punters to spend ever greater amounts of their hard-earned dosh, Amazon.com yesterday launched a text message shopping service, allowing people to compare product prices and buy things with an SMS from their mobile phone.

The new service will probably have real-world physical shops seething and foaming at the mouth, as Amazon's TextBuyIt service gives people the opportunity to send them a product name, UPC or ISBN number, directly from their portable phones (even from inside real world retailers) in order to get back a text detailing whether Amazon stocks the object of desire and how much it would cost. If Amazon’s price is better, the customer can even buy it directly, then and there, from their mobiles.

All a customer supposedly has to do is text over their Amazon log-in e-mail address and their shipping post code, after which Amazon calls them and, using an automated message system, guides them through the checkout process. When the transaction is complete, the punter gets both an SMS and an email confirmation of their purchase. If they want to track the item’s delivery, the customer can just check the full fat Amazon.com and see all the details online.

Most importantly, maybe now bookshops and electronics dealers will realise that it's not so easy to rip us off anymore and may have to actually resort to cutting prices to acceptable levels to begin with. µ

L’Inq

Amazon TextBuyIt