Recently, several friends or clients have wanted to pay me with Venmo, one of the payment methods I accept. Each thought they had to look up my Venmo handle or profile name, become friends with me, and then would be able to pay.

Not so, I revealed. All you need to make a payment on most mobile platforms is a person’s registered mobile number. Square Cash, Apple Cash, PayPal, Venmo, Zelle—all rely on this basic contact detail.

In this short tutorial, I share how one’s mobile number, registered on any number of mobile payment platforms, is the easiest way to send money or receive money.

PayPal

One of the oldest mobile payment platforms, PayPal also permits sending much larger sums of money per transaction and per month than others.

It’s possible to send money to any email address, even if it has not been registered to a PayPal account. If the recipient at that address chooses to accept and logs into an existing PayPal account, the email address gets activated on their profile.

However, it can be inconvenient or even unwanted by a recipient to tie any of their emails to their account. But if you have their phone number, just use that.

Venmo

Many folks think they must search for and befriend the people whom they want to pay. I wonder if this is because Venmo, a service of PayPal, is such a social payment platform.

I actually resisted using Venmo for several years because I was bothered by its default preference to share with my “friends” that I had paid someone. I’m now willing to pay privately on Venmo and I accept Venmo payments, too.

But you don’t need to know my Venmo name; my phone number that you already have is sufficient. Phone numbers are not a means to search for existing Venmo friends, but you can just tap the New Transaction button in the upper right and phone is among the recipient lookup choices.

Many More

Apple Cash uses the Messages app on Apple devices to send money. Apple’s iMessage service works with iPhone numbers as well as any email address registered as or in association with an Apple ID. Most people send text messages to mobile numbers so that’s naturally the easiest destination to consider.

Square’s Cash App offers nicknames like Venmo but a phone number is just as good. Zelle, which some banks offer as a transfer service, is content with a phone number alone.

Both use debit cards as a point of connection, even if a bank isn’t integrated. However, payment through Zelle requires that a recipient already be in your contacts.

Next time you want the convenience of making a secure mobile payment to a friend or service professional, you can arm yourself with their phone number alone. After all, for the sake of your arm, the number is probably way easier to punch into your phone than their email.