Toronto-based FreshBooks today announced it will launch a mobile card reader in 2016.
Set to be released sometime in the spring, the device will be familiar territory to anyone that has seen or used the card reader designed by Square. Like Square’s original card reader, FreshBooks’ card reader plugs into the 3.5mm headphone jack of an iPhone and allows a small business merchant to accept payment via credit card. The difference here is that the device is also able to read the more secure EMV chips found on many modern credit cards, in addition to the magnetic stripe found on all previous generation credit cards.
Moreover, the card reader is fully integrated with FreshBooks’ cloud accounting and payments software platform, so should a merchant use the reader to help facilitate a credit card transaction, their records will be automatically updated.
According to FreshBooks, payments are processed in less than 60 seconds, and credit card information is automatically encrypted and not stored on the device.
Launching in the U.S. first (a spokesperson for FreshBooks told us the device will launch in Canada a bit later in the year), the reader will cost $29 USD and will allow merchants to accept Visa, MasterCard and American Express cards. The card reader is compatible with iPhones and iPod Touch devices running iOS 8 and higher.