Payment tool BillMyParents allows teens to enhance social experience

Parents able to manage teens purchases on social networking sites with BillMyParents

Social e-commerce company Socialwise has today unveiled its new payment system BillMyParents, that enables teenagers to purchase goods and services on social networking sites and e-commerce sites such as Amazon.com.

As it says on the tin, BillMyParents involves the teens parents, giving them full control to either approve or reject their child?s purchases.  If the purchase is accepted, the parent can enter their credit card number, which is never accessed by the teen.

Socialwise chief executive officer James Collas refers to recent studies which show that more than $132 billion USD is spent annually by youth, and up to 40 per cent of teens not purchasing online due to the lack of a credit card.  He explained, ?The online teen spending market is hugely underserved and BillMyParents is uniquely poised to tap into the desire for teens to be able to shop online, while still letting parents maintain control in a safe and secure environment.?

The BillMyParents platform instantly alerts parents via email or text message when their child has made a purchase, the parent can then login at their leisure to make the secure payment.  Teens can purchase anything from Amazon.com via Socialwise?s online shopping site BMPshopping, additionally the company has forged partnerships with social networks Habbo, Artix Entertainment, Outspark and Rock You!

Teens can login to their control panel either on the BillMyParents website directly to see what purchases have been approved / declined, or alternatively the platform will be launching account management applications on MySpace and Facebook in the coming weeks.

Artix Entertainment?s business development manager, Daniel Vasile, explains the benefits of the partnership, ?Our partnership with SocialWise and BillMyParents adds a valuable and unique payment feature to our online role playing games.?  Vasile concludes, ?Many of our 80 million registered users worldwide are under 18, and by offering our young gamers and their parents an innovative, safe and easy way to make purchases and enhance game play, Artix is continuing to offer leading edge features that enhance the gaming experience.?