18 million iPHONE USERS HAVE NEVER BONKED to ApplePay

Something I've been meaning to ask - is it possible to use ApplePay in the UK yet? Or is it just in the USA for now?

All good & fine until...

Sunday night, after the sidewalks have rolled up for the evening in small towns, the Dollar General is still open but not accepting *any* type of transactions other than cash because their systems are down...

...AND THERE'S NO TOILET PAPER AT THE HOUSE....YOUR KIDS HAVE TAKEN ALL THE LOOSE COIN FROM YOUR CAR CONSOLE.... WHERE IS YOUR GOD NOW?

o.0

Payphones

I think this would be a fantastic technology for payphones.

Instead of fumbling around in your pocket for loose change you could simply use your smartphone to pay by NFC. I'm surprised no one has thought of this yet...

Er... Surely it's because there is nothing to *bonk* in most territories

I bonk whenever I can. Being in the UK that largely means Oyster and NFC enabled bank card transactions. I don't have any other bonkable available tech - and am not aware of any that are widely avaialble. I have an iPhone 6 too, and have never bonked with it.

Does that mean that Apple have made a mistake? No.

It just means that because ApplePay isn't available yet in the UK I cannot use the most bonkable tech with my iPhone 6. I have no choice but to continue using my card.

Either this analysis is exclusive to the US, and therefore limiting to one of the least advanced card bonking markets, or is global and therefore ignoring that the rest of the globe doesn't have ApplePay. Either way it's therefore largely irrelevant.

And I thought it was pretty good...

back in the UK for a few months and picked up an iPhone 6 to use whilst here...it noticed when I was setting it up that my Wells Fargo cards were supported and promptly added them to the iPay thing. Worked flawlessly at Boots, Sainsburys and Greggs (all in Reading). The interface was neat, and it let me choose between my debit and credit cards. I must admit the various till staff thought I was a bit odd until it flashed up on their screens that I had pid. I think my only complaint at this point is the £20 maximum.

It's fine in principle

If I could use it with the same frequency I can use the contactless payment on my bank card I would but unfortunately that was not to be. we should have knew if Apple put in an NFC chip they would fuck us over in some way regarding it's use the same way they did for Bluetooth.

What a ridiculous article. ApplePay is only available in the US so overseas users can't use it yet. It has only been out less than two months, so people are cautious in adopting it. Just like any technology.

In fact, the system is very safe - your credentials (fingerprint and pin) are checked on your own device - no need to trust someone else's device with that. The pin you put in on any other device could be stolen.

Similar discussion came up on the Register yesterday. For those reading here who did not see that article, this is what I wrote:

Apple's security is very strong:

http://www.networkworld.com/article/2174973/smartphones/apple-reveals-unprecedented-details-in-ios-security.html

and the referenced guide:

https://www.apple.com/br/privacy/docs/iOS_Security_Guide_Oct_2014.pdf

I had my third year and masters students analyze different aspects of this and they came up with loads of web references on the subject.

There will be a lot of negative comments made about ApplePay, mainly by those who stand to lose their power over the consumer. ApplePay actually protects the consumer:

http://www.gizmodo.com.au/2014/10/how-corporate-greed-is-trying-to-kill-apple-pay/

the thing tyhe banking world doesn't get is..

Consumers like cash. having a wad of notes makes you feel good. Abstracting it to something else just isn't the same. that's why casinos use chips, so it doesn't feel like real money.

Just think about how special a £50 note feels. It's more special than three £20 notes.

Simon

slow rollout

I've used Apple Pay at a few places but most don't have NFC yet. That will change by next October because terminals have to be upgraded/replaced to support chip cards, and most will include NFC.

In some ways, a not-so-fast rollout is an advantage as it allows firms to get bugs fixed while they don't have a large impact. For example, one large hardware chain has AP working for Visa, but for MasterCard the transaction shows on the phone as "done" (i.e. "Done" with a green check-mark) and then "Declined". The account is good however and using the actual plastic works just fine.

And said chain does have chip-readers in the terminals. Just not active. Having been hacked one might think that they would have flipped that switch. But - no. Go figure.