Recommended List of Boku Bingo Sites

What is Boku?

Boku is a brilliant way to deposit at mobile bingo sites without having to use your credit or debit card. In fact, by using this payment method, there is no need to disclose any of your financial details at all. When you use Pay by Phone bill bingo site, your payments are debited via your mobile phone service account instead. This is referred to within the industry as “carrier billing”.

So How Exactly does it Work?

More and more people access the internet and play bingo using their mobile phone. So what could be easier than depositing at a bingo site by just using your phone. No credit cards; no debit cards; no faffing around searching for expiry dates and smudged signature strip security codes while trying to key in the information with your remaining free hand. For sites that accept boku’s Pay by Phone Bill Bingo service, all you need is to supply your phone number and your payment is charged to your regular monthly mobile bill. It’s that easy.

When depositing at your chosen bingo site, there are two ways to do this. Select that you want to deposit with boku, you will then be asked to key in your mobile number. You are then sent a text asking you to confirm the payment. This is a security measure, preventing anyone who just has your phone number form making unauthorised purchases. All you need to do then is reply “Y” by text to authorise payment and to confirm your purchase. And that’s it. There isn’t even a charge for the text!

Once you have made your first payment, things can become even easier. Instead of having to key in your phone number for each transaction, your phone number can then be recognised. This means that you do not even have to input your mobile number each time you make a deposit. Instead, you will just need to confirm the amount you wish to pay. Usually this will be by tapping “Y”, but on some occasions you may be asked for a PIN.

So What Are The Advantages

There are many advantages to using any of the boku bingo sites above. Perhaps most importantly, it’s free. As a customer, there is no charge for using this service at all: not even for the required authorisation text. There are no fees to pay, nor any commission charge. The price you see is the price you pay. Instead, the bingo site owner pays a small commission to boku for facilitating your payment.

In addition, not only is it quick and convenient, but it’s very secure too. As you are not giving any of your banking details, your confidential financial information cannot be overseen, overheard or hacked. This is important when using a mobile, as you do not have the security of being at home sat on the sofa. When paying for things on the go, other people are within earshot and may be able to look over your shoulder to see what you are keying in. You are also likely to be using either a 3G / 4G connection or an open Wi-Fi connection, neither of which are very secure. By simply using your phone number and charging your payments to your monthly bill, everything is taken care of confidentially, quickly and easily. And with no banking details involved at all, there is no personal information to be stolen or hacked in any case.

Another great advantage is that boku’s Pay by Mobile works whichever type of mobile phone service you use. Most people today do have a contract phone, but it all works just as well even if you don’t: Pay As You Go customers can also use their phones to make a deposit. In this case, your payments are charged to your remaining call credit instead of being billed at the end of the month. This also means that it doesn’t matter if customers are without standard banking arrangements like a debit or credit card, or even if you have no bank account at all: you can still use boku’s service. A mobile phone really is all you need.

And What Are The Disadvantages?

Phone service providers usually put a cap on the amount of money you can allocate to your mobile bill. Usually this is a daily limit, such as £30. You will need to check with your service provider to see what limits or conditions are involved.

Also, some bingo customers find that it is more difficult to budget and keep control of their spending if they use their mobile to pay bills. This is because payments would normally be deducted via your bank account or credit card, but now there would be potentially a third spending account to keep an eye on.

But at the end of the day, the choice is yours. With boku’s Pay by Mobile service, making online payments really is a simple process: just a few taps on your mobile and everything is taken care of – completely free!

The History of Boku

In what is an oft repeated story, this quick and easy payment method was originally a British idea. But, as with so many other great inventions and innovations, the originators had to look elsewhere to find the investment necessary to make the idea a success.

The original idea of charging online purchase to a mobile phone account was dreamed up by entrepreneurs Glyn Smith and Thomas Kirk. They designed a new software application called Mobillcash. The pair set up their technology company Vidicom Ltd in Chesterfield, Derbyshire in 2003 in order to develop their idea. Sadly, they had to search elsewhere for the investment necessary to bring their plans to fruition, and found it across the Atlantic. Here, some Silicon Valley based venture capitalists liked what they saw and decided to provide the necessary funds.

Vidicom received around $13m in investment capital, and the newly named Boku Inc was then incorporated in Delaware in 2009, effectively becoming an American company. Its headquarters is currently in San Francisco, California. The Boku Pay by Phone Bill Bingo service was launched in the United States later that year. Further tranches of capital investment have been added on a regular basis over subsequent years in order to enable the service to expand worldwide. At the time of writing, over $90m has been raised from various sources to fund this global expansion.

This has enabled boku to launch in over 60 countries worldwide, securing agreements with over 300 different mobile phone signal carriers across these territories. They currently provide their Pay by Phone service across most of Europe and the Americas, plus much of the rest of the world too, including China, India and Japan. It is now the largest independent carrier billing company in the world, with payments widely accepted by most phone service operators and major online bingo sites.