Amazon Alexa to enable fuel payments at gas stations

“We’re excited to bring new technology and better experiences to the gas station,” said Eric Carmichael, fuels marketing manager at ExxonMobil America, in a statement. “We build and seek out technology that will wow our consumers, providing both ease of use and security.”

Trucking fleets also can upgrade from fuel cards to voice assistants like Alexa for fuel payment. This can be an effective method to curtail fuel card fraud, as ill-intentioned drivers cannot fill up personal vehicles or trade fuel cards for cash. 

Hackers can make backdoor entries into merchants’ corporate networks and gain access to payment card information. Magnetic stripe card payments are usually targeted as they lack the security features that EMV cards possess.

The fuel market does face some challenges in pushing EMV cards in fuel stations, as card networks will not make merchants liable for fraud until October, allowing sellers to take their time in migrating to payment systems that are more secure. 

For Amazon, payment at gas stations is yet another use case for Amazon Pay and an added feature to integrate Alexa into the everyday lives of consumers. Digital business-to-business (B2B) payments are on the rise, making it a $22 trillion industry globally.

The in-vehicle voice assistant based payments is a segment that is expected to add more services over time, based on the success of the current fuel payments feature. That said, adoption of the gas payment feature might not come easy, as paying for fuel via Alexa might involve consumers to go back and forth to confirm and activate gas pumps. However, initial adopters should set the wheels in motion, further helping Amazon fine-tune the feature to make it more user-friendly for the broader audience.