Another step towards the cashless society, Tilt makes its easy to chip in money without reaching for your wallet.
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A little like Kickstarter between friends, social payment app Tilt lets users collect funds to pay for anything from a joint birthday present to a group's big night out. Like many crowdfunding services, the person organising the fundraising has the option to set a funding goal and only receive payments if that goal is reached.
Officially launching in Australia after beta testing since October, Tilt is targeted at young people — particularly university students — and is accessible via iOS and Android apps as well as desktop browsers. Organisers can make their fundraising campaign public or else keep it private and only share the link with friends via email and social media.
Tilt is free for personal use by organisers and contributors, who are able to see who else has contributed, leave comments and upload photos. The service charges a 2.5 per cent fee for businesses using the Tilt Pro platform to sell goods and services or raise money.
The free Tilt service already has a wide range of local users, who collect an average of $185 from four contributors, says Tilt's Australian country manager Harrison Uffindell. Australian highlights include funding a 120-person pub crawl and a $5000 bucks night as well as 40 friends hiring a yacht for a party on Sydney Harbour.
To date Tilt's Australian growth has come via its ambassador program partnering with universities. While there are plenty of ways for young people to transfer funds, Uffindell says Tilt's strength is its ease of use and social nature.
"Comparing Tilt to a bank transfer is a bit like comparing Facebook to an email," he says.
"The two can do similar things but Tilt adds a social layer, bringing friends and money together. It takes about as long to start a Tilt campaign as it does to write a tweet."
Recently opening an office in Sydney, US-based Tilt is a graduate of high-profile startup incubator Y-Combinator which has backed a string of successful businesses including Dropbox, Airbnb and Reddit.
Today Tilt operates in more than 10 countries and it has secured more than $67 million in funding from Silicon Valley heavyweight investors including Facebook founding president Sean Parker, Reddit co-founder Alexis Ohanian and venture capital firm Andreessen Horowitz, backed by Netscape co-founder Marc Andreessen.
Like many crowdfunding platforms, Tilt's dispute resolution process is limited as it does not hold money in escrow. It advises users to do their research before backing public campaigns, as when a campaign reaches its goal the funds are transferred directly from contributors' credit cards to the organiser's bank account.
Tilt has several safeguards in place to limit misuse, with users required to upload photo identification and be verified before they can start a fundraising campaign. The business also has a security team manually monitoring campaigns to ensure they are legal and meet Tilt's acceptable use policy which bans collecting funds for a range of activities including gambling, supplying controlled substances and providing sex-related services.
Tilt's guidelines do not include a detailed dispute resolution process, instead users are encouraged to attempt to resolve disputes directly with the organiser of the campaign and to contact Tilt if they can't come to an agreement.
"Unlike many crowdfunding efforts Tilt is primarily designed to enable friends to pool their money to make things happen," Uffindell says.
"They tend to be collecting money from their immediate social network of close friends, such as chipping in money towards a birthday gift — everyone can see who has and hasn't paid so it keeps people pretty honest."
