The cost-free offering aims to take the typical frictions associated with sharing the cost of bills and expenses out of the equation.
“If you’ve struggled with dividing up (and getting paid back for) group dinners, shared household expenses, or even the monthly rent, it’s about to get easier,” said the company in a statement.
Users can click the “Get Started” button found in a group chat or the Payments Hub located within Facebook Messenger to use Split Payments. From there, they can choose to split a bill evenly or modify the contribution amount for each individual — with or without themselves included. Then, after entering a personalized message and confirming their Facebook Pay details, the request will be sent and become viewable in their group chat thread.
Facebook Messenger’s offering comes just in time for the holiday season. It responds to growing consumer adoption of peer-to-peer (P2P) payments. Just last year, peer-to-peer payments volume hit $393.9 billion and it is expected to reach $538.7 billion by the end of 2022.
