Lots of banks here (US) offer a p2p transfer services of some sort, but often, it's not as simple to use. For example, through Ally bank, I can send money to so

Lots of banks here (US) offer a p2p transfer services of some sort, but often, it's not as simple to use. For example, through Ally bank, I can send money to someone using PopMoney-- * If I know their bank routing number and account number, I can just send them money directly without any involvement on their end. * Most people will not just give out their account info, even though it's on every check they write. * I can use email or mobile phone to send a payment, but then the person on the other end has to deal with entering the same info into popmoney to accept the transaction. At that point, they have to trust popmoney. None of this would be a problem except that each bank uses a different system. Chase uses ChasePay. Ally and PNC use PopMoney. There are several others. This causes a lot of friction when sending money. "Oh, you use chase pay? Now I have to set up an account there, too." Venmo (and others) let you abstract away the bank details. Everyone in your friend group signs up for 1 account (and it could be a competing service. I like Sqaure Cash) and is ready to send. They also offer better account lookup and the ability to send a payment request.