How to pay with your iPhone

Your mobile phone started out as just that, a phone. At the time it was a phone and a crummy camera and Tetris player in one. As phones got more advanced - smarter, if you will - they've evolved to take over more and more functions that used to require their own devices.

IPhone can be an ereader

An iPhone can be an ereader, video camera, GPS navigation system, music player, games console even a level to help you hang pictures straight. However has it ever bought you lunch?

New technologies, apps and add-ons let smartphones both receive and make payments, and the then and there generation of phones in the coming years will go furthermore than ever to letting your mobile replace your wallet.

Lately, several solutions have popped up for small businesses - or anyone, actually - to accept card payments by attaching a card reader to their iPhone, iPod touch or iPad, or other smartphone.

Square, one of the most recognisable, is a small, square dongle that plugs into the headphone jack on an iOS or Android device, and lets the merchant swipe a customer's magnetic stripe card, converting their account data to an audio signal.

The main advantage to using the headphone jack or rather than the iPhone's 30-pin dock connector is that the dock connector is only on iOS devices, during every mobile has a headphone jack. This meant Square could roll out its system to Android by simply writing compatible software.

The dock connector is as well more expensive

Using the dock connector is as well more expensive, manufacturing-wise, and would require Square to get a licence from Apple, undergoing a pretty rigorous testing and certification process. Plus, now merchants can use a battery case with their devices or keep them plugged into power.

But one iPhone-based card reader does support Chip and PIN transactions: the iZettle, a free EMV chip card reader with accompanying app that connects to an iPhone or iPad's 30-pin dock connector.

SDK is available for Android

An SDK is available for Android and iOS developers to add it to their apps, and Card.io gets a small fee for each transaction.