eBusiness consultancy Portaltech has partnered with PayPal to help retailers offer their customers a fast and secure checkout experience on mobile devices. The move follows PayPal’s launch of its Mobile Express Checkout, a mobile-optimised version of its Express Checkout service.

The partnership was driven by recent research conducted by Portaltech and eDigital Research investigating the influencing factors and features of mobile apps, from a consumer’s perspective. “Convenience” was one of the top three most mentioned benefits of shopping via a mobile phone. 86 per cent of respondents revealed that they already have a PayPal account and a further 8 per cent said they “wanted one”. The study also found that 20 per cent of those with a smartphones had made a purchase via their mobile phones, with 93 per cent rating this as a “positive experience”.  A further 20 per cent said they “expected to spend more via their mobiles in the next 12 months”.

“Our QuickLive mCommerce app for the iPhone provides a mobile platform for retailers to showcase their range to consumers who want to browse and buy quickly and easily via their mobiles,” says Rachel Wilkinson, head of brand & retail at Portaltech. “Key to the success of any app is the convenience and usability factor, and we wanted to ensure that we got the checkout functionality right.

“Our research showed that the majority of customers polled already had a PayPal account and that PayPal was the preferred payment method via mobile. In addition there are 26m PayPal accounts held in the UK. We couldn’t ignore this feedback and PayPal became a must-have feature for our QuickLive mCommerce checkout.”

Portaltech’s first retailer iPhone App using PayPal’s Mobile Express Checkout will be released for L.K. Bennett in September.