invisible

I still believe that it is merchant/terminal dependent. Last year Singapore Rapid Transport rolled out using contactless card payment at trains and buses. You could use your contactless credit card for such purpose but mobile wallets were not accepted, only after a year they enabled mobile payment support.

RedSun

Security? Phone NFC is not bullet proof. Some stores ask to verify the physical cards at check-out. They afraid of virtual wallets.

Also, iPhone wallet can only hold up to 8 CCs. It helps, but it does not eliminate the need to carry multiple cards.

I bet there are still physical CCs in your wallet. With all the buzz of contactless CCs, most people still comfortable with the plastics. The only place that is different is probably China. Over there, data and phone are dirty cheap. People do not use credit cards and they get cash in their phones. So there is no plastics to talk about. Without phone, they are dead.

RedSun

I'd be so embarrassed with trouble at check-out in foreign countries. Some cashiers would think you have money trouble, do not have money, or do not want to pay.

Worth the troubles??

yugi

Well, if Google Pay doesn't work, then Samsung Pay works in 99% of the cases. Israel, for example, doesn't even use chip cards, and there is no NFC whatsoever, but Samsung pay worked almost everywhere in MST mode. There is no Google/Apple/Samsung Pay available in Israel for Israeli issued cards. Such a disappointment from a country of startups.

tmiw

If we can figure out exactly what scenarios are problematic, then one can maybe avoid such (or change the scenario) and have a higher reliability overall when one does use it. Perhaps someone with connections to Visa/MC or a bank who hangs out on FT and sees this thread would be able to take the needed steps to make those problematic scenarios less so. After all, if contactless is indeed supposed to be the future, wouldn't it be a good idea to figure out what's preventing that from happening?

From your other posts it sounds like you're using the Altitude Reserve for Apple/Google Pay, at least as the primary card. What physical card are you tapping that's working? IIRC US Bank doesn't have contactless cards at all, leaving AmEx and Chase as the most likely out of the major issuers (though there are some from smaller banks too).

Was it possibly purposely restricted due to it being a pilot? I don't know enough about how they implemented it on the backend but I do remember that it only worked with MC for a time.

12 cards on newer iPhones, IIRC. And for the vast majority of people (e.g. those who don't hang out on FT) that limit is not likely to be an issue.

Also, I recall discussion with you about this problem before. From what I remember it was potentially tied to gift cards being included in the transaction, not strictly because a mobile wallet was used. (However, it is likely easier to show a physical card when you're already using one than to convince the cashier that the card inside said mobile wallet is the same as the physical card.)

BTW, ID isn't supposed to be required per Visa/MC rules regardless of how the card's used (swipe/insert/tap). I highly recommend reporting such merchants to the card networks next time that happens (I'm presuming they're using the name on the physical card in conjunction with ID, but I could be mistaken):

https://usa.visa.com/Forms/visa-rules.html
https://www.mastercard.us/en-us/cons...-shopping.html

Maybe, maybe not. China is a special case since cards never really became a thing there.

I'd probably dispute the 99%, at least in the US with the Gear S3. (Sadly, from personal experience too.)

That said, most domestic merchants I go to support contactless now, so I just use Google Pay. The places where I don't are places where mobile payment would be problematic anyway (such as sit-down restaurants).

freecia

@RedSun - More countries are getting on with digital wallets and contactless payments. Japan, a cash centric society, has a surge of digital wallets/currencies right now. Apple Pay Suica (stored value, prepaid) and a lot of the Chinese tourism in Japan are gradually bringing about some changes. https://atadistance.net/2019/05/19/s...in-tokyo-area/ I usually find a digital wallet a tad bit faster these days than the card swipe. It probably helps like @yugi, I'm between Apple and Google HQ's so there's plenty of terminal adoption and cost of living is high (food trucks $12+ pp is totally normal, checkout fast as possible please). That said - I'm reluctant to pull out a $XXXX smart phone to pay in areas where phone theft is a distinct possibility and poverty is high.

I was just wondering where contactless might work and Apple Pay would fail yesterday, so I'm glad this popped up. It seemed odd that Chase finally re-introduced contactless cards late last year when so many people have digital wallets. Contactless cards (vs phone/watch) might be more convenient on TFL London in the winter when hands and faces are covered up, unless they also get Apple Pay Express Transit which reduces some of the auth button mashing/faceID.

tmiw

In my experience, contactless cards are more likely to fail than mobile wallets in the US--at least right now. I expect the difference to diminish over time.

Also, I'm not sure Chase would have bothered had mobile wallet use been higher. There are a bunch of reasons why that didn't pan out as quickly as hoped, though.

RedSun

I do not want to waste my time with this stuff.... Payment is a 1 minute thing, not a 5 minutes thing..

RedSun

You can spend hours and hours to do the research. But what the goal is? Pay and get paid. Let troubles and hassles to others.

yugi

I had no issue paying with a phone/watch in sit-down restaurants, since I gave my Prestige card to my wife, and I only carry it in a phone. You just need to ask. I carry CSR and Amex Gold as a backup. But in Israel, there no NFC at all, so I used it via MST, and it worked in most cases (I think only once it didn't work), and some places plainly refused to use phone. I carry both Samsung phone and watch, and in some places watch works better than a phone, but in most places it's vice versa.

invisible

I've never encountered this, but my travel is 90% outside of US
Yes. If there is sufficient incentive for me.
THEY are service personnel to provide service,not other way around. Once I spent 20 min make payment of $3000 because the terminal can accept only $100 via contactless (regardless of mode). So I run 30 transactions.

invisible

MST is just emulation of swiping the card and using magnetic strip.

RedSun

So, there are still things you do not know and have not experienced. US market has the most CCs, probably more than the rest of the world combined. And phone payments are probably less than 10% of all CC transactions. And a lot people do not even use CCs.....

Go figure. So my point is, why bother??

invisible

It was last year and before that, using locally issued cards which worked fine in Singapore, note - with terminals supporting Apple Pay (see below).

Probably. I specifically tried to add the same card to Apple Wallet on iphone and tried to use it at buses and MRT gates. Did not work. THe card itself worked, iphone - did not.
As I said, I have a corner supermarket next to my home. Contactless via card there works. Apple Pay - does not, tried with two different phones at least tree times over last 12 month. If it helps, processing system they use is WireCard.

invisible

Let me ask you - what is your goal writing such posts/replies?

I, based on my own personal experience, provided number of use cases. Other people provided their use cases as well. Only you are here, coming and loudly announcing - 'why bother'?

People told you why. As it was said - mobile payments are huge industry now. Here is Singapore we have Apple Pay, Google Pay, Samsung Pay and Fave Pay, Grab Pay, FitBit Pay (!), Singtel Dash - that's only what I remember. In Japan Mobile Suica is huge thing and even before Altitude came, you could top up Suica on your phone and get 3 miles per $ spent on CSR while the only other way to top up the physical card is via cash (at least for non-residents). And acceptance is Suica is pretty much everywhere.

And don't get me started about WeChat - even stalls selling pork buns next to Chinatown MRT are now accepting WeChat.

You can sit in your Fortress America and ignore the rest of the world while loudly declaring this here at FT, but world moves forward.