Since e-commerce is based on the Internet platform, its operating costs are relatively low, so it is more suitable for large, medium and small enterprises, government agencies and individual consumers. Due to the different consumption capabilities of enterprises and individual consumers of different sizes, the prices of goods and services on the Internet are also different, ranging from cars worth hundreds of thousands of yuan to short message services worth 0.1 yuan. Therefore, the same business entity can use different payment settlement methods for these different amounts of funds.
According to the scale of the amount of online payment in e-commerce, online payment methods can be divided into the following three categories.
(1) Micropayment. Micropayment refers to those e-commerce transactions with extremely small amounts, that is, low-value payments, with a transaction value of approximately less than US$5 (less than RMB 5 in China), such as paying a phone bill, sending a mobile phone text message, browsing a paid web page, listening to a paid song online, etc. Micropayment technology requires convenience and speed, and is mainly used in extremely small online transactions. Typical micropayment systems include IBM’s Micropayments system, Millicent wallet, Cybercoin, NetBill, Electronic Commerce Project, MPTP, etc.
(2) Consumer-level payment. Consumer-level payment refers to an online payment service system that meets the general payment needs of individual consumers and businesses (including enterprises) or government departments in economic transactions. It is also called a small retail system, and its transaction value is between US$5 and US$500 (the corresponding amount in China is RMB5 to RMB1,000). Consumer-level payments are executed by credit cards, smart cards, and electronic wallet transactions, such as buying a bouquet of flowers, buying learning materials, downloading paid software, etc.
(3) Business-level payment. Business-level payment refers to an online payment service system that meets the e-commerce business payment needs of general enterprises (including enterprises and governments). It is also called a large and medium-value fund transfer system, and its transaction value is approximately 500 euros or US dollars (the corresponding amount in China is more than RMB1,000). It is suitable for direct debit or electronic billing solutions, such as traditional EFT, E-Check, FEDI, CNAPS, corporate online banking services, etc.