In-App carrier billing for Android announced; nobody knows if it's 'allowed' though

Hello Mr Developer, would you like to use in-app payment for Android? Yes? Good.

What’s that?

You want to know if it’s allowed?

Well of course it’s allowed.

What about Google?

Well, they’re … they… they haven’t really said much about it. So when can we get you signed up?

What’s that? You want to know if Google approve of in-app carrier billing?

Why’s that a problem? Can’t you just, look just sign-up and wait and see?

What? What do you mean you can’t do business that way?

…

Such is the problem with having Google run it’s own mobile platform and not do it properly. I know a lot of companies who are keen to implement in-app billing, but four of them that I spoke to today will not be doing that any time soon because they simply don’t know if it’s ‘real’.

“It’s like a mirage,” said one leading mobile developer to me this afternoon, “We just don’t know if Google will allow it or change their mind in 2 months. We can’t do business like that.”

This is on the back of the rather exciting news that both Zongboku and Boku have announced in-app carrier billing for Android. Zong’s offering supports carrier billing in over 200 countries (reports TechCrunch). Zong’s got 179 carriers in 40+ countries including all the top one and two tiers in the US, (reports Moconews).

I’m pretty impressed with both offerings, I just hope that — at some point — we get a bit of clarity on whether Google well and truly allows in-app payments from other providers, or whether it will demand consumers continue to use it’s own Checkout system.

A little bit of clarity will see a lot of excitement from developers.

If you’re feeling brave, you can get started today with the Alpha Program from Boku.