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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

#381

Post by sithadmin »

snotrockets wrote: post #347
sithadmin wrote: post #231

Earlier quoted context omitted.

American merchants doing low customer volume (e.g. small shop, cafe, restaurant) are usually locked into using something like a terminal from First Data (~$150-200 USD minimum for the most basic device) and something in the ballpark of 2.2% to 2.7% in fees for every transaction. People paying the lower rate are doing over $50k per month in transaction volume. Compare that to competitors in the space like Square, whic…

The basic square hardware is about 1/5 the price you listed, but I don't think it's the price, but the effort – filling a form in the app vs waiting for a package to arrive in the mail, and setting up some extra hardware (What I must wonder is what Apple charges Square for this feature)

It has probably been 5 years since I've encountered the most basic Square reader in the wild (the $10 magstripe one), and I can think of a single time in the past two years I've encountered the cheap one you're referencing (which is why I forgot about it in the first place).

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

#382

Post by np- »

emteycz wrote: post #295
profmonocle wrote: post #209

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Something I was thinking about the other day is how some modern credit cards technically have four different ways to pay. Swiping pressure-sensitive paper over the raised numbers (the original method) is still possible, though I haven't seen a merchant actually do this since maybe the mid-2000's. Then you have magstripe, chip, and RFID all in the same card. Pretty impressive backwards compatibility, although I think…

I had a merchant use the numbers on paper method in 2017.

I rented a bicycle in Florida a few days ago where the merchant took an imprint of my card (yeah, in February 2022). I'm not even sure how that can possibly be cheaper than one of those Square devices at this point.

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

#383

Post by rootusrootus »

gandalfian wrote: post #31

Whinge: but the term "Tap to Pay" winds me up. "Hover to Pay" maybe, or "Contactless" makes sense. But tap the card reader with your card and you disturb the touchscreen and cancel the payment. Don't tap it's a trick.

For all practical purposes, though, it's a tap for most people. What's the limit on NFC? 1.5 inches? At least half of everyone that uses it will inadvertently hit the screen anyway. The UI should be designed with that expectation IMO.

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

#384

Post by YoungWeb »

Contactless payments are great but there are many intermediaries in 1 simple purchase in the current payment processing system. I would like to see digital payments evolve into true p2p transactions. Let me pass you my bits. I don't want to pass them to bob, jessica, then larry and then have larry pass you the bits.

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

#385

Post by matthewaveryusa »

Does anyone have a doc with the specifics of how tap-to-pay works? Specifically, what happens when mulitple individuals are in proximity? I imagine there's a payment request broadcast followed by a payment allow response, followed by the broadcaster sending a subsequent request message to a selected payment response? I'm curious about the specifics and what kind of clever things the protocol has to maximize security and minimize DoS, and what kind of information is transmitted on each leg of the protocol

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

#386

Post by akprasad »

kache_ wrote: post #215
tannedNerd wrote: post #176

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Eh, the apple article explicitly says other platforms soon. With all of apples recent anti trust issues I expect that to be less than a month or two or they could be accused harming smaller companies again by favoring stripe.

Out of the loop: the comment you're replying to is referring to the Bolt CEO claiming that Stripe is in cahoots with other organizations, particularly ycombinator & hnews to manipulate the perception of stripe. The reference to the mob is a play on the fact that the cofounders are Irish.

n=1, but I don't have any mental association between "mob" and being Irish, and I don't feel comfortable reading that intent into the original tweets without stronger evidence.

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

#388

Post by nsp »

vxNsr wrote: post #364
scrollaway wrote: post #346

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Cards are slowly moving towards not having printed numbers at all, and having the numbers only available via the issuer's app or website. This allows for rotating numbers.

Care to share some examples? I’ve never seen this in the US

Apple card is the only one I'm aware of

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

#389

Post by blowski »

munk-a wrote: post #331
jon-wood wrote: post #268

Earlier quoted context omitted.

On at least one of my cards magstripe is officially considered a legacy feature, I have to explicitly request that it's enabled if I'm travelling to a place likely to make use of magstripe payments, and it will only remain enabled for one or two weeks.

Just don't assume that's to do you any favors - credit card fraud is 100% on them, the removal of features is to minimize fraud and if it's a feature you still occasionally need it's being done at your expense.

Sure it’s 100% on the credit card company, but it’s still very inconvenient for the cardholder.

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

#390

Post by vmception »

rootusrootus wrote: post #377
vmception wrote: post #253

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't like Zelle because I like using a credit card and accumulating credit card points. so its a non-starter for me. although one time I did a chargeback on a Venmo transaction, and Venmo banned me. that was an inconvenient few months before I maybe tricked their system. maybe as in I'm not sure they are just tolerating me.

But Zelle, Venmo, and similar are cash apps...? Why would you want to pay a 3% credit card fee per transaction just so you could accumulate a couple credit card points?

Venmo takes credit card. Zelle does not at all.

A couple reasons when eating that credit card fee is worth it for me:

1) Although it is accurate that paying the merchant fees yourself as a consumer makes it a loss on the credit card points, the points themselves can have a much higher exchange rate with transfer partners, which makes it not a loss. For example, with the credit card company their points are range from a value of half a cent to 2 cents each, a hotel or airline may have a fixed exchange rate based on a different metric such as quality or distance, that is completely decoupled from the current dollar value of the good and service. (ie. a fancy hotel might cost $300 one night and $1,700 another night, but only costs 25,000 points all nights. better to just have a balance of points)

2) Many of my purchases are expenses I deduct against my taxable earnings, and that makes me less price sensitive and more spend sensitive. The points I can use solely for my consumptive activities, which makes play time free.

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