Sky’s the Limit for Amazon Payments As It Handles Onboard Purchases for Southwest

Many consumers will find it easier to make onboard entertainment purchases when flying on Southwest Airlines Inc. now that the airline is accepting Pay with Amazon.

Announced Wednesday, the service enables Southwest passengers who have stored payment data in their Amazon.com Inc. accounts to pay with those credentials. To pay for entertainment options on their laptops or mobile devices, passengers can use their Amazon user names and passwords to log in and authorize payment, eliminating the need to type in a 16-digit card number, a name, an expiration date, and an address. They can use the payment option to pay for WiFi access, messaging, and movies.

Southwest also accepts PayPal on board for entertainment purchases, an airline spokeswoman says. The Amazon deal does not include complementary access to Amazon.com, she notes.

Like any merchant offering a mobile-commerce service, Southwest is trying to improve sales. The new payment option also benefits Amazon, suggests one analyst.

“From the positive side, Amazon’s payment services have a reasonably broad reach across merchants and many consumers have established credentials with the company,” says Beth Robertson, managing director of Robertson Payments Services LLC, in an email to Digital Transactions News.

“The service will enable an alternative to air travelers to digging for a card and providing specific card information to pay for services; it’s an ease of use play, extending the typical e-commerce venue associated with Amazon’s payment services to a semi-point-of-sale arena,” she says.

One question, however, concerns whether consumers will remember their Amazon credentials. “Southwest has a lot of repeat travelers, so perhaps once [passengers] know this is a payment option, they’ll be prepared on the next trip,” Robertson says. “It is an easy and confidential approach to making a payment for services while on a plane.”