AI agents can now pay without seeing your card. The same week, United and Amazon are shutting agents out

"You're absolutely right. That was a $4,000 purchase." That joke reply landed under the news on Nov. 13 that OpenAI had launched ChatGPT Wallet, a way for its AI agents to pay for things. Watcher.Guru's post announcing it drew about 4,900 likes.

According to OpenAI's blog, ChatGPT Wallet lets its "dots" agents complete purchases for users. You add a card once, then approve each purchase after reviewing the items, total and card, using Face ID or a fingerprint. On approval the card network issues a payment token tied to that transaction, so neither the merchant nor the agent sees the real card number. It was built with American Express, Mastercard and Visa, and card rewards and dispute protections stay in place. It starts with ChatGPT Pro subscribers in the US aged 18 and over, using US-issued cards. OpenAI says it will later let users pre-approve purchases within set limits, categories or time windows.

CNBC reports OpenAI is not taking a cut of transactions for now. It is the company's second try at checkout after last year's Instant Checkout failed to catch on, and it shipped a Commerce Partner Playbook to help merchants avoid blocking agents by accident. The same day Google connected Google Wallet to Gemini for all US users, though that is read-only spending analysis, not payments.

Many stores are still closing the door. United Airlines said this week it will block agents from booking tickets, and Amazon already stops agents from buying on its site. Under OpenAI president Greg Brockman's post, one reply read "But not @united," and another noted that while agents never see your card, "the company in the middle still sees everything you bought."