Visa, one in every of the world’s largest digital payment platforms, announced this week that it has embedded its payment network into ChatGPT, enabling the chatbot to buy and complete transactions independently.
It means the AI agent, owned by OpenAI, shall be able to recommending products for purchase and completing transactions on the user’s behalf, potentially at any vendor that accepts Visa.
Previous attempts to integrate its payment network into an AI platform have been limited to a single merchant or a set of enrolled participants.
While it will not be OpenAI’s first foray into the e-commerce space, the mixing follows a wobbly step into the sector.
Last 12 months, the corporate announced Quick Checkout, which allowed ChatGPT to act as a private shopper by combing the web for specific items. The method was error-prone and never widely adopted by merchants resulting from fees set by the tech company.
Quick Checkout was scrapped in March.
The corporate’s latest iteration differs in that it’ll allow users to link their Visa cards on to ChatGPT for shopping, aiming to streamline payments between merchants and AI agents.
OpenAI will provide the technology that permits agents to interact, make decisions and initiate purchases through ChatGPT. Visa, the world’s largest payment network outside of China, will provide the payment authorization and fraud monitoring needed to operate the infrastructure at scale.
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“As AI agents turn into energetic participants within the economy, Visa’s focus is to make sure transactions are trusted, secure and seamless,” Jack Forestell, chief product and strategy officer at Visa, told The Associated Press in an announcement.
The ChatGPT app icon appears on a smartphone screen on Aug. 4, 2025, in Chicago.
AP Photo/Kiichiro Sato
At an organization event on Wednesday, Forestell illustrated how the acquisition process would work by showing a ChatGPT user asking it to search out a pair of wireless headphones for lower than $150. The bot would locate and buy the item based on those instructions.
“I feel we’re generally at a spot where most persons are very comfortable with the shopping elements of it and have discovered this as a superior discovery experience,” Forestell said in an interview.
But, he added, making the leap from having AI agents recommend what to purchase to doing the purchasing “just requires a complete different level of trust.”
“But that every one comes from the underlying infrastructure, the method, the safety that we construct into it and the foundations,” he continued.
OpenAI has not said how much merchants or customers shall be charged to make use of the service, nor has it outlined the broader financial terms of the collaboration.
The now-obsolete Quick Checkout charged merchants 4 per cent of the transaction’s value.
Third parties, including banks and retailers, have voiced concerns concerning the AI agent potentially overspending, purchasing the incorrect item or receiving customer complaints for transactions they didn’t authorize.
Banks have also raised alarm bells over the opportunity of fraud claims when the AI bot uses a bank customer’s credit or debit card.
Visa says the feature will include built-in spending limits and mandatory approval procedures, and that the agent will only be permitted to make use of customers’ cards at merchants approved by OpenAI.
Forestell acknowledged that it’ll take time to construct consumer trust and said that in its beta stage, the automated payment system will incorporate human oversight and notifications that customers must approve for a transaction to proceed.
He also said Visa will handle disputes following the identical fundamental rules it uses for some other transaction: Did the buyer really intend to make the acquisition and did the merchant process it appropriately? Where it would change, he added, is that if each the buyer intent and the merchant processing were done the best way, but “something happened in the center that caused an issue.”
“And that’s why we’re modifying our whole token framework and data capture process with Visa Intelligent Commerce to ensure that problem doesn’t occur,” Forestell said.
Visa’s closest competitor, Mastercard, has introduced integrated AI shopping features on a smaller scale and in a special vein, specializing in business services reasonably than purchasing options for individual users.
For instance, if a coffee shop desires to launch an promoting campaign, it might authorize an AI agent to buy services from digital ad providers to construct out the campaign.
Global News asked Visa whether users will find a way to opt out of integrated payment features, but didn’t receive a response.
— with files from The Associated Press
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