British multinational bank and financial services company Barclays today announced that its mobile banking app for iPhone has picked up Siri integration, allowing customers to ask the personal assistant to make hands-free payments on their behalf.
Earlier this week, iOS developer @r_idn uncovered evidence from the accidentally released HomePod firmware that Apple's iPhone 8 may permit users to authenticate Apple Pay transactions with a face scan instead of through a fingerprint.
Apple announced during yesterday's earnings call with Wall Street analysts and investors that its contactless mobile payments system is coming to customers in the United Arab Emirates, Denmark, Finland and Sweden before the end of this calendar year.
The United States department store chain JCPenney announced on Monday that it is now accepting Apple Pay at its retail locations nationwide.
Samsung Electronics today announced expanded partnership with PayPal to make it possible for customers to make in-app, online and in-store purchases with PayPal as a payment method within Samsung Pay. Access to PayPal will be available for all Samsung Pay users in the United States and will expand to other countries soon, the company said.
“Users simply add their PayPal account to Samsung Pay, and can then spend the balance anywhere Samsung Pay is accepted,” said a Samsung executive. Users will benefit from Samsung Pay's services like gift cards, and membership and loyalty programs.
The move will open up PayPal to millions of stores, PayPal noted.
“This partnership will give our customers the ability to pay with mobile almost anywhere consumers can swipe or tap a credit card,” said the Korean firm.
As a bonus, merchants will even be able to accept Samsung Pay as a method of payment in-app and online through Braintree Direct, a PayPal service. Samsung Pay works in almost any in-store POS location in the United States.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nR8jxpFW1j8
The PayPal integration with Samsung Pay is supported on select Samsung phones, including Galaxy S8 and Galaxy S8 Plus. Last week, PayPal announced expanded Apple ID integration allowing customers in additional countries to set up PayPal as a payment method for App Store, iTunes Store and iBooks Store purchases.
Unlike Apple Pay which works with NFC point-of-sale systems, Samsung Pay supports both NFC terminals and those using traditional Magnetic Secure Transmission technology that lets it replicate a card swipe and work nearly anywhere that payment cards are accepted.
“Thanks to Samsung's advanced technology, Samsung Pay is the most widely-accepted mobile payment platform in the market and works almost anywhere you can swipe or tap a card today,” said the company. “Now, with the integration of the PayPal wallet, customers can use Samsung Pay in the most convenient ways possible.”
Samsung Pay is now available in 18 markets.
A Boston Retail Partners survey on mobile payments ranked Apple Pay first in the United States as having the largest percentage of merchants, with 36 percent accepting the technology, up from 16 percent the year before.
PayPal was a close second with 34 percent acceptance, followed by MasterCard PayPass (25 percent), Android Pay (24 percent), Visa Checkout (20 percent), Samsung Pay (18 percent), Chase Pay (11 percent) and private label mobile wallets with four percent.
PayPal previously said its popular payment system would work with Android Pay to support both mobile payments in apps and those in brick-and-mortar retailers.
Apple today launched a large-scale Apple Pay promotion in China, offering various discounts and rewards to customers who would use Apple Pay between July 18 and July 24 to make purchases in participating merchants across mainland China.
Billed as the largest Apple Pay promotion to date in the 1.33 billion people country, it offers discounts of up to 50 percent and as much as 50 times the usual number of reward points for credit cards, with 17 Chinese banks offering 50 times the reward points accrued when transactions are made using credit cards registered with Apple Pay.
Apple's website lists 28 retail locations that are participating in the promotion, including international brands such as 7-Eleven, Watsons, Burger King, Starbucks and more.
JD.com along with an additional fifteen online merchants are part of the promo, too.
Apple Pay launched in China in February of last year.
“I am happy to see that Apple finally has decided to do something to gain market share in China,” IDC China's managing director Kitty Fok told South China Morning Post.
According to research firm Analysys, Chinese mobile payment market is dominated by Alibaba and Tencent, whose Alipay and WeChat Pay held respective 53.7 percent and 39.5 percent of the market as of the first quarter of 2017.
Alipay and WeChat Pay also offer various cash rebates or discounts now and then.
From July 1 through July 15, Apple is donating $1 to the National Park Foundation for every purchase made with Apple Pay at any Apple Store, on apple.com or through the Apple Store app for iPhone and iPad in the United States.
Apple Pay is accepted at select locations in some of the most popular national parks, from Yellowstone and Yosemite to the Grand Canyon and Muir Woods National Monument.
Proceeds will support the National Park Foundation’s mission to help protect and preserve national parks through conservation projects and other initiatives, as well as inspire the next generation of park enthusiasts with enriching youth programming.
According to CEO Tim Cook:
America’s national parks are an inspiration to us at Apple, and we know they are as important to many of our customers as they are to us. Our goal is to leave the world better than we found it, so this July we’re making it easier for anyone to help preserve the beauty of our natural, cultural and historical treasures.
Apple Watch owners who complete a walk, run or wheelchair workout of 3.5 miles (about 5.6 kilometers) on July 15, which matches the length of a hike from Old Faithful to Mallard Lake in Yellowstone National Park, will earn a special badge in the Activity app and unique stickers in the Messages app for iPhone, inspired by national parks.
Apple adds that App Store will soon highlight a collection of “some of the best apps to help users easily navigate and explore the country’s most beautiful national parks.”
If you try to use your credit card to fund an Apple Pay person-to-person payment over iMessage, Apple will tack on a 3% fee, reports Recode. The fee is standard among similar P2P services, and necessary to cover credit card transaction costs, but it's worth pointing out to potential users.
If you don't want to incur the 3% fee, simply use your debit card to fund the Apple Pay P2P payment, as this method is completely free.
Apple announced the new iMessage-based service during its WWDC keynote earlier this week. With it, you'll be able to use any card stored in Apple Pay to send money to other users. Once sent, the money loads onto a prepaid Apple Pay Cash card, where it can be spent or withdrawn.
Apple Pay Cash will go live after Apple publicly launches iOS 11 this fall.
Source: Recode
Apple Pay is set to launch in Ukraine in the second quarter of next year, according to an anonymous tipster in one of the Ukrainian payment systems. PaySpace Magazine is reporting (Google Translate) that Maxim Patrin, the chief of e-business with financial institution Alfa-Bank, mentioned that Apple Pay might make its debut in the country sometime next year.
Alfa-Bank today unveiled a new digital banking service, called Alfa Digital, which will permit customers to add their cards to Apple Pay when the service hits Ukraine. According to MacRumors, the country currently lacks Apple Pay, Android Pay and Samsung Pay.
Samsung Pay is rumored to launch in Ukraine later this year.
Apple could be working to bring Apple Pay to India soon.
The mobile payments service currently works in 16 major markets: Australia, Canada, China, France, Hong Kong, Ireland, Italy, Japan, New Zealand, Russia, Singapore, Spain, Switzerland, Taiwan, UK and US.
Despite low buying power, India with its population of 1.32 billion people represents a massive marketing opportunity for the increasingly popular smartphone payment services. Small wonder that the Cupertino company now appears to be preparing to bring its own mobile payments service to its customers in India, said a new report.
Apple Pay currently works in sixteen major markets.
According to a BusinessStandard article, the iPhone maker has submitted at least five applications with the Indian Patent office over the past year, all related to its digital payments system. The patent applications range from using biometrics to authenticate payments to securely transferring payment to a device such as a point of sale device.
While Indian law clearly states that software is intrinsically not patentable, exceptions exist for devices with software. If Apple's patents are granted, Apple Pay could hurt homegrown digital payments firms such as Paytm, Mobikwik, Freecharge and several others.
Samsung Pay launched in India in March 2017, while Google plans to bring Android Pay there later this year by anchoring the service to the government-backed Unified Payments Interface.
Last week, Facebook made a patent application of its own with the Indian Patent office. It outlines a digital wallet service that would presumably be integrated into its popular Messenger and WhatsApp messaging services.
Apple has been doubling down on the Services category as a way to boost sales of iPhones in India and elsewhere. Recently, the firm began assembling iPhone SE in Bangalore, in a facility run by its supplier Wistron, marking the first time the cupertino company has assembled any iPhone model in the country.
Apple has officially launched its mobile payments service in Italy, a 61 million people country and the third-largest national economy in the Eurozone. Apple Pay launched in the country with initial support for Visa and MasterCard debit and credit cards issued by Carrefour and UniCredit, as well as Boon prepay.
Boon is a European prepaid service and app that lets users conduct transactions at all point of sale terminals that accept MasterCard contactless payments. Boon customers are currently allowed to register prepaid MasterCard cards with Apple Pay.
According to Apple's website, support for additional banks will be added later this year.
Some of the official partners listed on Apple's website included merchants and companies such as Auchan, Autogrill, Eataly, LaGardenia, H&M, Leroy Merlin, Limoni, OVS, Simply Market, Unieuro and more.
After registering their card with Apple Pay by tapping Add Credit or Debit Card in the Wallet app on any iOS device with iOS 8.1 or later, Visa and MasterCard holders can start using the service to pay for their purchases in stores, within apps and on supported websites via their iPhone, iPad, Apple Watch or Touch ID-enabled Mac.
The service could soon launch in Belgium and South Korea, circumstantial evidence suggests.
Last month, Apple Pay launched in Taiwan.
Apple's mobile payments service is currently available in these 16 markets:
Australia Canada China France Hong Kong Ireland Italy Japan New Zealand Russia Singapore Spain Switzerland Taiwan United Kingdom United StatesVisit the iOS Feature Availability webpage for the full, continually updated list of countries, banks, credit unions and other financial institutions that currently support Apple Pay.
In related news, Apple Pay in the US added support for more than two dozen new financial institutions earlier today. Additionally, Liaoning Rural Credit Cooperatives in Mainland China now supports Apple Pay, too.
According to Recode, the Cupertino giant is secretly developing a peer-to-peer service for transferring cash digitally between friends, plus virtual prepaid cards that would run on Visa’s debit network and work with Apple Pay.
Oil giant ExxonMobil introduced basic Apple Pay support within its mobile Speedpass+ app in March 2016, allowing customers to pay for fuel at approximately 6,000 gas stations nationwide. Yesterday, the company announced that customers can now pay for fuel and car washes using their Apple Watch and Apple Pay at over 10,000 Exxon and Mobil refueling stations across the United States.
Users must launch the Speedpass+ app on their watch and select the pump they're at to authorize it for payment. Next, press the Side button twice to invoke Apple Pay and approve the payment. You can start fueling up your vehicle.
Other new features available within the app include support for Touch ID app protection and Ford vehicles equipped with SYNC 3 technology to easily authorize payments, making it the first fuel payment connected car app in the United States.
Ford owners can additionally use the Speedpass+ app to check how much fuel is left in the tank when they are away from their car. Customers even have the option to apply for an ExxonMobil-branded credit card issued by Citibank from inside the app.
Once your application has been approved, the card will be automatically added as a payment option within the app, and you can start using it right away. For a limited time, new accounts shall receive a savings of 20 cents per gallon for the first two months, then six cents on every gallon after that, the company said.
ExxonMobil's app now supports several payment methods, including major credit cards, debit cards, ExxonMobil Smart Cards, Apple Pay and Samsung Pay.
ExxonMobile Speedpass+ for iOS is available for free on App Store.