Majuki

Mrs. Majuki and I are in Las Vegas, and we used the Just Walk Out store at Resorts World for the first time. The entrance didn't accept a mobile payment to enter, but I had no problem using contactless on the physical card.

RedLight2015

I was there and noticed the same thing. Ugh Amazon.

tmiw

The next question is, was that intentional on Amazon's part or is it some sort of software issue they haven't gotten around to fixing? In theory they're not supposed to discriminate between cards and devices but it's possible the networks loosened that rule since we last looked.

Majuki

It's hard to say. I forget the exact text, but it said something like, "Sorry. Mobile payments are not yet supported. You can pay with contactless if your card supports the feature."

cbn42

My guess is that the mobile payments will work just fine. Perhaps the employee who made the sign didn't realize it. Or perhaps Amazon wants to discourage mobile payments because they don't want their competitors (Apple and Google) to get a cut of the sales.

Majuki

I should have been clearer.... I did try using my phone, and that sign on the display popped up.

tmiw

Speaking of which, I looked in both of the latest Visa and MC rules and I'm not actually sure the card networks prohibit merchants from only accepting contactless cards. At least, I didn't see anything specifically saying so. Maybe it would fall under "honor all cards" but that rule seems to be more a prohibition on, say, not accepting Visa Infinite/Signature while still accepting lower-cost Visa cards. In any case, I can think of a couple of places that would block mobile wallets while still allowing physical cards to be tapped (Walmart for example).

As for technical issues, maybe Amazon is thinking that someone's DAN could change on them while they shop? Though I would think they could just do a pre-auth prior to entry to avoid that. It might not even need to be that large of a pre-auth amount, either, since apparently we still allow tip adjust at restaurants (not to mention the many gas stations that seem to do a $1 authorization only to update to the final amount pumped later).

RedLight2015

It popped up on the Ingenico terminal when I tapped my Apple Pay.

When Amazon pop up stores were a thing, they had Clover stations, and they even went was far as taping off the Apple Pay logo and said the manager said no Apple Pay, only Amazon Pay.

In other words, Amazon is even worse than Tesla at this whole anti apple thing.

tmiw

The wording of the error and the fact that contactless was enabled at all points more to some sort of technical issue than Amazon being anti-Apple Pay. Otherwise, I'd have expected contactless being disabled and them simply supporting either their own system or inserting a card.

Majuki

My guess is as you stated that the DAN could theoretically update while one is shopping. The store does put a $1 preauth on the card when you enter, so I think this is a solvable problem.

PrendellHiggins

Google Pay/Apple Pay do not charge additional fees for merchants. I believe Apple charges issuing banks fees, but Google Pay is free for everyone involved. It's probably why PayPal/Venmo integrates their cards with Google Wallet but not Apple Wallet.

tmiw

It's not unheard of for merchants to be charged more for contactless transactions than inserted ones, though I don't know how often that happens in the US. Plus, that sort of thing is more likely to cause contactless to be disabled altogether, not only disabled for certain form factors.

tmiw

Looks like we're finally getting non-card/phone forms of contactless in the form of rings. You have to have a checking account at a small bank I've never heard of, though (Quontic Bank). I'm also not sure how well it'll work in practice considering how often employees have refused to enable terminals without seeing a physical card, but we'll see.

Majuki

This is a cool concept, but it does require a willing cashier if contactless doesn't automatically enable. Fortunately this hasn't been as much of a problem since early 2020 with more customer facing terminals.

storewanderer

Wendy's is screwed up, and the franchisees are having to foot the bill for this new equipment.

For whatever reason they won't update the iPP320s to accept Contactless, they say the locations have to get new pinpads to accept Contactless.

Some franchisees have taken this as an order to get new registers. So in my area there are two franchisees: one replaced all of the registers but still has the iPP320s. So no Contactless there. The other didn't replace any registers but replaced all of the pinpads and the new pinpads accept Contactless.

The iPP320s are probably well kept since Wendy's has barely been open inside for the past 2 years.