Apple working with 'INSERT ANY CC PROVIDER' on iPhone 6 Mobile Payments...
More interesting is the question which technology will be used. NFC has to play a role here, because the technology is in the market and scalable. My weirder and more riskier bet is that NFC on the Apple wearable will refit all older iPhones with mobile payments. Until now noone has put NFC on a wearable, even though it makes most sense to have it on a wrist.
Most PoS systems in the U.S. are being updated to read chipped cards for the big EMV-related liability shift[1], anyway, so it makes sense to add NFC while they're at it.
That is why in most countries (I can't speak for the US) they cap the maximum withdraw limit to something like $100. That way the risk to the bank and consumer is minimal.
Here in Australia our largest bank (Commonwealth Bank) has an app that will generate a code that you can enter into the ATM to make a withdrawal i.e. card not required. It has a similar risk profile to NFC.
Yes it is. It's possible to charge contactless payment cards even when they're in someone's wallet. That said, it is certainly possible for the implementation to be more secure on smartphones. I knew as soon as I saw the fingerprint scanner and iBeacon tech in the current iPhones that this is what Apple would be aiming for.
It is a coincidence, and it is odd that Apple seems to get attribution for emerging technology trends.
All of the payment vendors are or have already embraced NFC. Here in Canada, NFC is ubiquitous, and I'd be surprised if it wasn't in the US. MasterCard's PayPass, for instance, is NFC.
The reason they get credit is that people actually use the solutions they provide.
So they get credit because of a perception bubble. I've been using Google Wallet for a while now, it works fine. Before that I had a PayPass credit card, which also worked just fine.
The reason they get credit is that people actually use the solutions they provide.
The entire payment industry is moving to chip / NFC, and the parent offers up that maybe Whole Foods is prepping for Apple.
No, they aren't. They're prepping for, again, the entire payment industry. Hundreds of products across all major payment vendors. You haven't used it because the US payment space in particular is very slow, but soon enough every card you carry will feature it, and the technology will be ubiquitous, with or without Apple getting involved.
This happens repeatedly: Apple is very good at choosing the right time to enter a market -- hitting it when it hits primetime -- and then they get credit for creating the market. Incidental, but I saw an incredible conversation the other day where multiple participants were vilifying Apple's competitors for copying Apple on wearables.
> This happens repeatedly: Apple is very good at choosing the right time to enter a market -- hitting it when it hits primetime -- and then they get credit for creating the market. I
I know. Remember when Microsoft started the tablet market in 2003 and then Apple comes along 7 years later and steals credit for tablets! Psh!
And remember when Apple got credit for smartphones when all they did was enter the market that BlackBerry had created and turn it on it's fricken head with a device so much of a leap-frog that blackberry management thought would never ship? [http://mathiasmikkelsen.com/2011/05/blackberry-makers-though...]
And remember when they strolled into the MP3 player market after the Rio players were crushing it with literally thousands of units sold every year? They step into that market right when it's about to blow up and next thing you know, everybody acts like Apple was the company that put the white buds in everybody's ears!
In all seriousness, yes, Apple does of course time their entry into a market. And when they do, they unleash a torrent of innovation, marketing, and brand goodwill. I bet name recognition for fitbit is under 50% on the street. What do you think that would/will be if Apple released a similar wearable? Like them or not, Apple products are iconic. My dad knows iPod and iPhone. Do you think he knows HTC One? Or even Galaxy S?
Nobody contests that Apple products are iconic. The trouble, a lot of people seem to think that since Apple popularized something, they "own" it now and any other company that enters the market (or was in the market before Apple!) is now "stealing" what rightfully belongs to Apple.
I live in Ireland where a fair few retailers support NFC payments and I have a card that has it. Most people don't use it.
Apple will be the first company to convince the rest of my technophobic family to actually use the technology. You're not wrong, in payments they will certainly take more credit than they are due. But, they will increase the uptake more than anyone through their implementation and you have to give them credit for that.
The interesting thing about that insight is that it does seem as though people are trying to copy Apple before they have even entered the arena. They will probably, fairly or unfairly, also get credit for creating the wearables market. My best guess is that Apple will freeze the market on Sept 9th with a product that is far superior. If they do, that conversation may ring true in the next few months.
I probably give them too much credit and you give them too little - seems like a reasonable balance.
Also, completely agree that Wholefoods are not entering because of Apple. Seems a poor assumption to be making
>Apple will be the first company to convince the rest of my technophobic family to actually use the technology.
You seem pretty certain of that. Apple has a long list of initiative failures.
Are you overloading the technology side of this? I'm not saying "Apple versus Google Wallet", for instance -- pretty much every Canadian Mastercard, and now many debit card, has NFC on it. I pay at the gas station and the grocery store by moving my card in proximity to a reader. This is ubiquitous. Putting an Apple middleman in the solution seems unnecessary and backwards.
The interesting thing about that insight is that it does seem as though people are trying to copy Apple before they have even entered the arena.
I find this line of thought simply incredible. Wearables have been around for years, and are a simple manifestation of technological refinement in processors, displays, batteries, and wireless technology. It is happening because the technology is there and making it both possible and compelling. Yes, Apple will eventually get in the market, but the notion that everyone else is copying Apple in advance is simply incredible.
I probably give them too much credit and you give them too little - seems like a reasonable balance.
Again, the entire payment industry is moving to NFC. Wearables are becoming technologically possible and powerful. In neither case does Apple deserve any credit at all -- this isn't a case where the middle ground must be right -- and it is rather incredible when they are given any.
My parents could not text, could not make a phone call, couldn't use GPS before the iPhone. As soon as they picked up that phone, they could work it perfectly. Sure, the component parts of the solution were already there but that doesn't create a product that people use.
I should be clearer on the payments issue - this isn't a technology problem. All the technology is already there. But, I don't think Apple will serve as a what you would call a middleman They will create an experience that people can actually use. The component parts add up to nothing if no one will use them. Living in a market where NFC is fairly ubiquitous, I watch most people simply ignore it's there at all.
>Wearables have been around for years
There is nothing truly compelling about any of the wearables I have seen or used over the last two years. I never said 'everyone' in the market was copying Apple. I think products like Pebble have done a great job. I was referring to the huge number of products thrown out by Samsung, Sony, LG in the last few months that give off a certain ring of desperation.
>it is rather incredible when they are given any.
My guess is that the first company to move, let's say 50 million wearables, will be Apple. Pick any smart watch and try and sell it to a non-techie. Most people will not buy it. If those products were developed in a vacuum, away from Apple's influence, over the next few years I think people still wouldn't buy them. People value design, user experience mixed in with those new technologies. I don't understand how you cannot credit them at all. Microsoft had commercially available tablets long before Apple did. No one bought them. And most people aren't buying wearables and will not until Apple enters the market. You may call that timing but I don't - it's much more than that.
I acknowledge that payments are more ubiquitous than smartphones, tablets and wearables were when Apple entered the market. That does dilute my payments argument a bit. Maybe a middle ground can't be found here but to give them no credit at all seems rather ludicrous.
Is the payment industry prepping for fingerprint authenticated NFC?
In half a year we're likely to see discussions about how whatever Apple is launching in 9 days was "obvious" and how they once again just happened to catch the wave at the right time. And for some reason other companies suddenly find it technologically feasible to fit NFC into their wearables, something that was apparently impossible before 9.9. 2014.
Not only do you hold up things that Apple hasn't released, gloating about their grand innovation of vapour, you apparently don't realize that credit cards have NFC. There is nothing "impossible" about fitting NFC in just about anything, and your strawman simply makes no sense at all.
Fingerprint authenticated NFC? That would be solving a complete non-problem, misunderstanding the whole role of NFC.
You can get business cards with NFC. Every Skylander action figure has NFC in it. Credit and payment cards have NFC. But here you're comically holding that putting it in a wearable will be a grand innovation.
This sort of bubble and ignorance is extraordinary. But yes, I fully expect that after Apple releases something, years after so many others embraced NFC, you'll go forth telling all how innovative they were.
I know what NFC is. I know how easy it is to implement and how cheap it is (I have two dev boards myself).
I was making a joke. My point was that after Apple releases something, many competitors often follow the same path, even though said technology has been available for years, the difference being that once Apple puts it together in a usable way and adds good software on top, others decide they need to implement the same thing. Was 2010 the year when a thin, ARM based tablet computer finally became technically feasible? Of course not. But when Apple released the iPad, the rest of the world rushed to follow their example (including BlackBerry and HP).
In any case, let's come back in half a year or a year and see how other companies have responded to what, if anything Apple releases next week.
At least in the UK NFC has way too much momentum for Apple to hope to compete with anything else, but it's all contactless payment cards. I don't know anybody using NFC on their phones but I definitely would (or better yet a wearable, that's really smart) use it if something was there for it.
I just realised that since the London underground is about to go contactless I'll potentially be able to use my phone/a wearable instead of an oyster card or even a contactless card. That's awesome!
I have one of these. It's great, and always draws comment when I use it. But it is just a small contactless card, of the type you might stick to the back of your phone, in a cavity in a rubber bracelet.
I had a wristwatch a couple of years ago that had an NFC sim in it for payments too, but that never worked reliably.
An Amex card is no harder to get than a MC/Visa. Costco has done quite well in the relevant middle-class-american-suburb market with an Amex-only policy. This isn't the barrier.
The retail penetration, however, is the barrier. If you can't use these things mostly everywhere, this service is going to be no more successful than Google Wallet.
The whole advantage of Apple getting into payments is the fact that they have millions of credit cards for their customers. The advantage is muted if they require those customers to get new cards. It is quite safe to assume they are working to partner with all of the major credit card companies and AMEX happens to be one of them.
Chicken or the Egg... which comes first? That's one problem. Must support it in the phone (or wearable) before you can use it at the store... must support it at the store before it's worth supporting on the phone...
The second issue is fragmentation. Look at wireless charging. Two separate solutions. What works at McDonald's won't work at Starbucks (and vice versa). Although both support wireless charging, they support different models.
http://www.androidauthority.com/qi-a4wp-wireless-charging-st...
What use is a wireless payment service going to be if 90% of phones can't use it? When there is a competing standard?
>> "An Amex card is no harder to get than a MC/Visa."
Do Amex do a debit card? In Europe (certainly in the UK) debit cards are in much wider use than credit cards and Visa and Mastercard debit cards are given with almost every bank account.
They do a particularly weird instrument called a "charge card." It's not a debit card because it's not pulling straight from a checking account, but there's no long-term line of credit either. It's like a credit card that you're actually required to pay in full every month. So no different from responsible credit card use, but still not credit.
> They do a particularly weird instrument called a "charge card."
It should be noted that they also offer regular credit cards, in addition to the charge card, and these do not require payment in full at the end of the bill cycle.
The benefit of the charge card (Disclaimer: I have an Amex charge card) is that you can have an extremely large line of credit for those 21-30 days. It's less for balancing your finances and more for spend management (they have great tools to see where all of the money is going, very nice management for multiple family/corp cards, etc).
I'd still trade the charge card for their Costco version.
True, but AFAK with Amex there is no "lending institution." You get the card from American Express itself and it does not involve a relationship with a bank.
Yes, they do (it depends on the issuing bank, though.) I guess technically it's just a credit card with zero credit limit so you have to have some money in the account.
Percentage Fees charged for AmEx in Europe are 100-300% higher for small mom&pop stores, than for Visa/MC. Talked to my local bakery about it recently. They would be charged 5.5% of the bill if the customer used AmEx, but 2% if the customer used Visa.
The places where I can't use my American Express have been almost non-existent. One or two mom and pop restaurants were Visa only, but that is about it.
Almost all of my monthly spending is on my American Express.
Agreed, I make almost all my purchases with my Amex card (mostly because of unlimited 2% cash back on everything). It's usually smaller independent restaurants that don't take American Express. It's something that I never really understood, because American Express in my experience charges lower transaction fees than Visa/Mastercard. When I had an Amex merchant account they charged a flat $7/month fee with no per-transaction fees, though our volume wasn't very high.
However, you have to setup the American Express account separately, which probably has a lot to do with why many mom and pop type restaurants don't take it. But now that a lot of new restaurants seem to be using processors like Square, this is a complete non-issue.
That's not my experience. I have to use an Amex card for work to make IT purchases all the time and I'd say a good 25 to 30% of the places I try to use Amex at don't except it.
I am a normal consumer, I have never used American Express for business purposes. 25 - 30% seems really high though, considering American Express used to be targeted mainly towards business users...
You can walk into any Walmart and get a Bluebird prepaid American Express card for <$5 with almost all of the benefits of a checking account without the checks.
That's assuming the technology being developed is to store an existing credit card on your phone - isn't it more likely that Apple will try to make a play that involves your app store payment setup? Presumably, the implementation would be to expose your payment setup as a "virtual" Amex on your iPhone, but without making you a direct customer of Amex, but clearing the transaction through the Amex network.
True, although in the Netherlands this seems to be changing in the last few years. A lot of restaurants and stores for clothes/shoes etc are now accepting them. Grocery stores over here almost never accept credit cards.
If Apple sings some kind of exclusive deal for iPhone payments with the credit card companies I expect that half of Europe will start accepting credit cards because people willing to pay for a 600 euro phone are an interesting market segment.
I meant American Express. Acceptance of Mastercard and Visa is fine here, but American Express used to be far behind and is now playing catch-up.
And for groceries in Amsterdam for example you're going to be searching for quite some time for a supermarket that accepts credit cards. They only accept debit, which is what 99% of the population has as their primary card. Of course everybody has a credit card as well, but that's mostly used for online shopping and things like restaurants, not supermarkets.
So totally different from the US where any supermarket accepts credit-cards.
Discover is non-existing in at least northern Europe.
American Express is a bad choice for many parts of Europe because companies are use to very low processing fees, and AMEX (and Diners Club) are very expensive credit card to process.
Seems some people beg to differ. However AMEX costs more for the retailer, therefore, with everyone already with Visa/MC, why, as a retailer allow people to pay with AMEX? If you want to double your transaction costs, eat into your profit margin, have more admin for the book-keeper, then why not!!!
Part of the point of AMEX is that everyone is insured against scammers that bit more, hence the higher price/charges, however, in Europe where we have C+P nobody really wants AMEX - their business case just is not heard.
CC fraud in America, contrary to popular European belief, is not a problem for American consumers. American consumers are not liable for fraudulent charges made with their card; resolving them is a simple matter of telling your CC company that the charge was fraudulent (the majority of the time, the CC company has already figured that out themselves).
Chip and Pin buys American consumers fuck-all; it is merchants and CC companies that benefit.
European consumers seem to want American consumers to have chip and pin more than American consumers want it for themselves. It is truly bizarre. Are you guys getting a "refer your friends" commission or something?
There are countless USA tourists who go to Europe with their non-chip-and-pin cards and then wonder why it doesn't work. And that must suck for your holidays. So let's try to reduce that.
Chip and PIN has nothing to do with Amex's consumer-friendly chargeback policies. C+P tries to prevent fraudulent transactions, charebacks give consumers over misbehaving merchants.
More interesting is the question which technology will be used. NFC has to play a role here, because the technology is in the market and scalable. My weirder and more riskier bet is that NFC on the Apple wearable will refit all older iPhones with mobile payments. Until now noone has put NFC on a wearable, even though it makes most sense to have it on a wrist.