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Apple unveils contactless payments via Tap to Pay on iPhone

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Re: Apple unveils contactless payments via Tap to Pay on iPhone

#111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

EU has contactless paying for a while now, but it uses a chip embedded in the bank card.

I studied abroad in France in 2012--at this time, all European card readers had been chip-based for quite a while and my US credit card didn't have one. I couldn't figure out how to use them and many store clerks had no idea what to do with my magnetic-strip credit card. I went to England in 2019, at which point cards in the US had been updated to use magnetic stripes, and everyone was using tap-to-pay. It turns out…

We in The Netherlands are one of the most cashless societies in Europe. We mostly pay with our mobiles or contactless with banking cards. We even are "going Dutch" sharing our bills with what we call a Tikkie: One person pays the bill and then we send over instant messaging our payment request for money which can be payed directly with one click and authentication in banking app.

One thing that is annoying for foreigners with credit cards is that they are barely accepted here. We work mostly with Maestro and almost all Dutch e-commerce sites work with Ideal which directly link to the banking apps of the local banks.

My wallet does not contain any cash anymore and just an ID and OV card.

https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/dutch-payment-landscape-one-m...

Re: Apple unveils contactless payments via Tap to Pay on iPhone

#112
post #47

I would really like to see it become normal for tipping people this way (that isn't at a cash register / tap) but with AirDrop. For example, I recently had movers. I went out of my way to get a cash tip for them earlier. It would have been nice to skip that and just ping it at them somehow without awkwardly saying "Hey friend do you have Venmo? Apple Pay? CashApp? I'd like to tip you. What's your phone number?! Let m…

Quoted post unavailable.

> I read this sort of thing all of the time and it sounds as if you're just going out of your way to not carry cash for the sake of it. The drawer behind me right now has loose change in it, my jeans pocket always has a fiver.

What happens when you tip that fiver away? You have to go to the ATM and replace it.

It's been years since I've carried a wallet in my pocket. When I go out I have my keys in one pocket and a phone, whose case has a slot for a credit card in it, in the other pocket. I never have my debit card with me, and my memory of the PIN keeps getting rustier. The barrier to getting cash and then carrying it around keeps getting higher; and it's rare that I have a problem from the lack of it.

Re: Apple unveils contactless payments via Tap to Pay on iPhone

#113
post #14

Clarification due to a somewhat confusing title: This is about the merchant using an iPhone to accept credit cards and other Tap to Pay devices. The customer was able to pay with Tap to Pay with their iPhone for a while now.

I honestly don't see what's so revolutionary about this. Why would anyone shell out multiple hundreds of € when a device that accepts payments can be purchased for a fraction of the iPhone price? E.g the most expensive device here [1] is only 120 €, and it can also print the bill. The cheapest that does the job is a mere 20 €.

Because a lot of people, going by the sales numbers, have iPhones? It’s more for very small businesses, who just need a quick and easy way to take card payments. Larger outfits will naturally invest in “real” PoS devices.

Re: Apple unveils contactless payments via Tap to Pay on iPhone

#114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I honestly don't see what's so revolutionary about this. Why would anyone shell out multiple hundreds of € when a device that accepts payments can be purchased for a fraction of the iPhone price? E.g the most expensive device here [1] is only 120 €, and it can also print the bill. The cheapest that does the job is a mere 20 €.

Well, if you already have an iPhone ? I would assume this is for small vendors? Otherwise indeed I do not see the point.

Might be big for bigger vendors too. I know Oracle extorts at least some merchants at least a few hundred dollars per year per credit card terminal for the privilege (“interface license fee” or some BS) of being able to use it. The more some of these legacy middlemen get taken out of the picture, the better.

Re: Apple unveils contactless payments via Tap to Pay on iPhone

#115
post #82
post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I had movers a couple months ago and tried to tip them. Note that I don't ever carry cash and am a proponent of abolishing the Federal Reserve. I asked them for their Ethereum or Bitcoin address, and they said, "neither of us don't have that, but we take cash." I calmly tried to explain to them the evils of the Federal Reserve for around five minutes, then began to set them up with their own cryptocurrency wallets on…

I can't tell if this is satire or not.

I thought it clearly was sarcasm/satire, but now you've made me doubt.

Re: Apple unveils contactless payments via Tap to Pay on iPhone

#116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

EU has contactless paying for a while now, but it uses a chip embedded in the bank card.

I studied abroad in France in 2012--at this time, all European card readers had been chip-based for quite a while and my US credit card didn't have one. I couldn't figure out how to use them and many store clerks had no idea what to do with my magnetic-strip credit card. I went to England in 2019, at which point cards in the US had been updated to use magnetic stripes, and everyone was using tap-to-pay. It turns out…

worth mentioning that this seems a problem limited to the US. Even in Canada, the smallest of towns will have contactless payment. Many Canadians don't really use cash because interac/credit cards have all supported tap to pay for over a decade now.

Re: Apple unveils contactless payments via Tap to Pay on iPhone

#117
post #47

I would really like to see it become normal for tipping people this way (that isn't at a cash register / tap) but with AirDrop. For example, I recently had movers. I went out of my way to get a cash tip for them earlier. It would have been nice to skip that and just ping it at them somehow without awkwardly saying "Hey friend do you have Venmo? Apple Pay? CashApp? I'd like to tip you. What's your phone number?! Let m…

Quoted post unavailable.

I have to go out of my way to get cash. It’s not that I avoid carrying it, it’s that I never use it for anything so I don’t have it on hand. I never pay for anything with cash except tips, and the smallest bills I can get from an ATM are $20, which (except in the case of movers) is already more than a typical delivery tip.

Re: Apple unveils contactless payments via Tap to Pay on iPhone

#118
post #20

Three interesting implications from this press release: - Stripe as the first user of the SDK vs Square: For any small business starting this spring, I can't think of a reason why they wouldn't use and iPhone+Stripe to start off. Zero hardware cost (assuming they have an iPhone), no need to wait for hardware delivery. - NFC will be coming to the iPad. - The ability to keep the same hardware but switch payment network…

Presumably companies like Square and Clover are selling their own POS hardware and probably are less than happy that every iPad and iPhone running latest OS with NFC is now a competitor to their hardware. Stripe does not make hardware (as far as I’m aware) so this initial partnership makes sense.

No software company wants to sell hardware outside of Apple. They only do so when forced to support their services. Software scales with a marginal cost of $0 and is much less messy.

Before smart phones and generic hardware was a thing, I worked at a company that wrote software for field services (“sending people places to do things”) we had to resell and maintain custom ruggedized windows mobile devices, mobile satellite receivers (cell phone data wasn’t reliable), etc. We were glad to transition to generic smart phones. At later jobs, when I worked in the same space, we used generic Samsung Android tablets.

Microsoft doesn’t even really care if you buy an XBox, it’s a loss leader. They would be more than happy if you bought their subscription gaming service and ran it on someone else’s hardware.

Re: Apple unveils contactless payments via Tap to Pay on iPhone

#119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think tap to pay can be skimmed in the same way you can with swiping. You'd have to actually clone the data on the NFC chip, which isn't possible through a tap from what I understand.

It’d be trivial for a rogue payment app to display one $ amount on the screen yet deduct another.

This risk also applies to any card terminal where you pay contactlessly. In Europe, that effectively means every card terminal everywhere and a comfortable majority of card transactions (https://www.mastercard.com/news/europe/en-uk/newsroom/press-... says 75% of mastercard transactions in Europe are contactless).

The main protections against this are maximum limits for unverified contactless purchases (about €50, depending on the country) and banks outright guaranteeing customers against fraud (https://europa.eu/youreurope/citizens/consumers/financial-pr...).

No idea how that can translate directly onto phone-based terminals though. On cards, the extra-validation backup for suspicious/over the daily limit transactions is that the contactless machine asks you for your pin, but there's no way anybody should be typing their card pin into a random stranger's iPhone.

Re: Apple unveils contactless payments via Tap to Pay on iPhone

#120
post #82
post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I had movers a couple months ago and tried to tip them. Note that I don't ever carry cash and am a proponent of abolishing the Federal Reserve. I asked them for their Ethereum or Bitcoin address, and they said, "neither of us don't have that, but we take cash." I calmly tried to explain to them the evils of the Federal Reserve for around five minutes, then began to set them up with their own cryptocurrency wallets on…

I can't tell if this is satire or not.

I feel it has to be. Who is tipping their movers only $5?
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