I think I was able to use Apple Pay more times in a week in the UK than I have been able to do in the past year here in the US. There are no more places near me that accept it than did a year ago. 
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Apple Pay - A year later, what's the verdict?
- Thread starter Zimmy68
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It does the job, I could take it or leave it. There's nothing significant enough to be compelling. I think the easily amused may be enamored but it's just a different way to pay. Nothing revolutionary or earth shattering.
One reason I rarely even try Apple Pay anymore is because seeing the logo is no guarantee that it is going to work.
For example, I saw the logo the other week at The Gap but when I tried Apple Pay it failed and the clerk said they don't support it, even though the terminal theoretically DOES.
I'm not going to waste my time trying Apple Pay if half the time it fails due to a misconfigured terminal. Swiping my card ALWAYS works, so I'll just do that. It's a shame because Apple Pay had potential.
For example, I saw the logo the other week at The Gap but when I tried Apple Pay it failed and the clerk said they don't support it, even though the terminal theoretically DOES.
I'm not going to waste my time trying Apple Pay if half the time it fails due to a misconfigured terminal. Swiping my card ALWAYS works, so I'll just do that. It's a shame because Apple Pay had potential.
Not surprised--Gap is owned by the same people who own Banana Republic and Old Navy, both of which are MCX members. I don't remember seeing a contactless logo at the latter though.
I went to work without my wallet today, I had no cash and no cards, but thanks to Apple Watch I had a nice lunch in my break and got some shopping done too. It is very fast, reliable, anonymous (as far as the retailer is concerned) and extremely convenient. And it is a safe way of paying too.
This, nothing to debate here, if it works where and your able to use it then It is what it is carry on. More stores need to adopt it faster so that I can use it more often then not.
It's incredible if you ask me. I just got a new 6S and am thrilled to be using it. Let me regale you with my $13.08 of success stories.
At Sports Authority, on the Apple site, the cashier didn't know a thing about it but we got it to scan. It wanted a 4-digit code, which I didn't know. I think I know it now. She, by the way, was probably the worst paid of any cashiers and actually gave me the most help in trying to get it to work.
At Subway, it's worked twice, for a total of $13.08 of charges. At a different Subway it didn't work and the cashier, "No hablo pay de manzana".
At Save Mart (listed on the Apple site), 4 cashiers tried to help me process it. The first contemptuously told me to press the pay by credit card button even though I'd already got it to scan and accept my fingerprint. The problem is, it would do that, then throw me back to the pay type screen at the self-checkout register. Three other cashiers, offered me the exact same solution, and all 4 just walked away from me without waiting for it to finish. I had to swipe.
I asked the Verizon store, where I was going to buy the iPhone if they took it? "Nope, but we take Android Pay".
I tried at WalMart and they too had not heard of Apple Pay. The cashier had the blank look I've come to love when I tried to use it. To be fair, I didn't think it would work there but it's on the Apple site as coming soon.
So, it is going to work at an Apple store if I try to buy an iMac, right?
At Sports Authority, on the Apple site, the cashier didn't know a thing about it but we got it to scan. It wanted a 4-digit code, which I didn't know. I think I know it now. She, by the way, was probably the worst paid of any cashiers and actually gave me the most help in trying to get it to work.
At Subway, it's worked twice, for a total of $13.08 of charges. At a different Subway it didn't work and the cashier, "No hablo pay de manzana".
At Save Mart (listed on the Apple site), 4 cashiers tried to help me process it. The first contemptuously told me to press the pay by credit card button even though I'd already got it to scan and accept my fingerprint. The problem is, it would do that, then throw me back to the pay type screen at the self-checkout register. Three other cashiers, offered me the exact same solution, and all 4 just walked away from me without waiting for it to finish. I had to swipe.
I asked the Verizon store, where I was going to buy the iPhone if they took it? "Nope, but we take Android Pay".
I tried at WalMart and they too had not heard of Apple Pay. The cashier had the blank look I've come to love when I tried to use it. To be fair, I didn't think it would work there but it's on the Apple site as coming soon.
So, it is going to work at an Apple store if I try to buy an iMac, right?
At self checkout machines you usually have to press credit first, then tap or else it won't work like what you experienced, also try reglar checkout at Save Mart and I bet it works just fine. I've seen something similar with similar self checkout machine, it kept looping for a friend until I pressed credit then they tapped again and it worked. It will most likely work at the Verizon store as well, same tech. Wal-Mart will probably never work or until Target begins to support Apple Pay. Apple Store has the correct reader, so it should work fine there.
So in short...
UK resident: Apple Pay is awesome.
US resident: Apple Pay is a total failure.
About what I expected. The question now is whether the US experience will become like the UK's and how long that will take. Square's new reader should help with that.
UK resident: Apple Pay is awesome.
US resident: Apple Pay is a total failure.
About what I expected. The question now is whether the US experience will become like the UK's and how long that will take. Square's new reader should help with that.
hmm very odd, next time for sure try regular checkout, that should work for sure.
This business, in the US of having a hybrid debit/credit card, and having to select credit or debit even when using apple pay sounds like a recipe for confusion.
I tried Save Mart again, at the register this time, at a different store and the same result, well almost, let me explain.
1. The cashier spent, I don't know, 3 years talking to the customer in front of me about their sticky program (you get a sticker for every $10, get enough stickers, get a knife or something). I hate the sticky program, when I want to use self-checkout it forces an approval making me wait.
2. Save Mart is 30% more than Walmart, on everything. Save Mart is a tiny bit more convenient but without the Discover/10%/double bonus I've pretty much stopped shopping there. And WalMart doesn't make me do the stickies. Did I mention that I hate the stickies?
3. When it fails, they all do the same thing, hit credit card, then they tell me the card is invalid. Considering I've swiped it there and I had just used Apple Pay at Staples 15 minutes earlier, nope, the problem is not me.
The cashier got testy with me about swiping and I simply said, "nope, I don't have to swipe, I can just leave", which I did, to the pleasing sound of "need manager to void a transaction", and went to WalMart, which is actually on my way home too.
PS: if any of you were in line behind me, my apologies, because I bet it took 5 minutes to find a manager, although what he could have been doing in an empty store is beyond me.
My guess is something in the Lucky transition broke Apple Pay. Possibly Lucky's system doesn't understand it even though it says Apple Pay on the screen. I don't know!
I do know that Apple has seriously half-arsed the implementation of Apple Pay. The cashiers are clueless about it for the most part.
How? They don't have much control over what merchants decide to do, especially ones that aren't official retailers.
Save Mart was on the Apple site, although Save Mart became Lucky a couple of weeks ago so who knows how that affects it. I think Lucky was always part of the same group but their internal systems are probably different.
Tech people are lazy today. No, seriously, we are. We like to write code, do the technical things, roll it out and wait for the world to come to us. If Apple wants this to succeed, they may have to get in the trenches, train and promote it to the people using it, instead of standing on their lofty tax free perch.
Jeez, man, I've failed to make it work at 3 places listed on the Apple site.
Most of the places I shop, even ones with new chip readers, don't have NFC readers. The ones that do fail to work about 50% of the time. The phone will say ok but the cashier says it failed. A frustrating waste of time for me.
The new chip readers are slow as molasses. The new tech may be more secure but I've failed to experience any improved convenience.
The new chip readers are slow as molasses. The new tech may be more secure but I've failed to experience any improved convenience.
Don't have them or they're not enabled? A lot of places use the same Verifone and Ingenico terminals that official Apple Pay retailers use and those definitely have NFC hardware. (Hint: they're behind the screen now instead of a separate attachment.)
Besides Save Mart, where? Last places I used it were probably Trader Joe's and Walgreens and it worked fine there.
If Apple Pay is a failure, it is the fault of the various merchants that haven't yet upgraded.
I use it quite often, even when I have to train the cashier sometimes ("Ring it as credit..", some cashiers don't know that they accept it or how to do it).
However, many merchants haven't even upgraded to chip cards, so universally the merchants are still taking their sweet time.
I use it quite often, even when I have to train the cashier sometimes ("Ring it as credit..", some cashiers don't know that they accept it or how to do it).
However, many merchants haven't even upgraded to chip cards, so universally the merchants are still taking their sweet time.
Maybe. Thinking about it more though, the future isn't going to be tapping a phone on a reader. In fact, I think there'll be a lot less reliance on manned registers in general over time. Imagine being able to have RFID readers inside of a shopping cart detect the items you put in it. Once you're done, you pay in the store's app using Apple Pay and walk out the door without having to wait in any lines.
Or what about at a restaurant? Instead of waiting for the server to come back with the card machine (or more likely, for the card and signature slip since we're not getting PIN with chip), you could scan a QR code on the receipt and pay with Apple Pay that way. In a busy restaurant that could save customers significant time.
In short, Apple Pay will likely get far more use in-app than in store eventually. It's weird that Apple focused more on the in-store aspect when our infrastructure is nowhere close to fully supporting NFC and very well may never do.
Personally, I'm done with Apple Pay. Over the last three months I have been very aggressive when it comes to using Apple Pay due to the Discover card cash back (this is probably their plan to start with). As December comes to an end, I will say that I've officially done with Apple Pay. I will continue to use Apple Pay at new place until the end of the year then I'm done. After that I will simply use my new chip-signature. Here are some of my issues for the US side of things:
1. Overall training is horrible (that's more of an under statement), pathetic would be the right word. From store to store (even if they are the same company) you can expect different treatment. Some are extremely knowledgeable, some just down right think you are wasting their time.
2. Inconsistency in reading NFC, when it works its great. When it doesn't, which is most of the time it's impossible to get it to work and many times employee has no idea what's going on.
3. Some employee simply doesn't know and doesn't care, and will simply lie to get you off of their back. You have no idea how many time I walk into a store which I have used Apple Pay, and was told to my face that they don't take Apple Pay. How are they so sure? Even if you don't know at least tell me to wait and you can go find out more.
4. Lack of official help from Apple. Most of the information on Apple's website is out of date, it's pathetic for Apple to try to push this technology but at the same time makes absolutely no effort in trying to help their customer (or even the merchant) to speed up the adaption of Apple Pay POS.
In conclusion, the overall experience is just horrible. Now that chip-signature has arrived along with the pathetic of implementation of Apple Pay, I will simply switch to chip-signature. At least I don't have to hear, "oh you what? Apple...what? Pay?" or my favor one "Oh you have to PHYSICALLY TAP(touch) YOUR PHONE TO THE PAD, THAT'S why it's not working....."
Sorry for the rant, but my experience today was pretty much the last straw. This is not the IT JUST WORK Apple that I'm used to.
1. Overall training is horrible (that's more of an under statement), pathetic would be the right word. From store to store (even if they are the same company) you can expect different treatment. Some are extremely knowledgeable, some just down right think you are wasting their time.
2. Inconsistency in reading NFC, when it works its great. When it doesn't, which is most of the time it's impossible to get it to work and many times employee has no idea what's going on.
3. Some employee simply doesn't know and doesn't care, and will simply lie to get you off of their back. You have no idea how many time I walk into a store which I have used Apple Pay, and was told to my face that they don't take Apple Pay. How are they so sure? Even if you don't know at least tell me to wait and you can go find out more.
4. Lack of official help from Apple. Most of the information on Apple's website is out of date, it's pathetic for Apple to try to push this technology but at the same time makes absolutely no effort in trying to help their customer (or even the merchant) to speed up the adaption of Apple Pay POS.
In conclusion, the overall experience is just horrible. Now that chip-signature has arrived along with the pathetic of implementation of Apple Pay, I will simply switch to chip-signature. At least I don't have to hear, "oh you what? Apple...what? Pay?" or my favor one "Oh you have to PHYSICALLY TAP(touch) YOUR PHONE TO THE PAD, THAT'S why it's not working....."
Sorry for the rant, but my experience today was pretty much the last straw. This is not the IT JUST WORK Apple that I'm used to.
Keep in mind that Apple Pay is more than just NFC payments, but a mechanism for easily paying for stuff inside apps as well. The way I see it, NFC maybe* solves a pain point in the current shopping paradigm that in a way was introduced by the move to chip, but doesn't do anything to help with how things will shape up over the long term.
Basically, we have the technology now to provide shoppers with a checkout-free shopping experience. Imagine having items be scanned as they're placed in a cart. An app running on the phone keeps a running total of your shopping. When you're done, paying for those items is as simple as using Touch ID. (Even Apple does this with their own app when you're buying accessories at an Apple Store.) It's not just stores either; imagine not having to wait for a server at a restaurant to take your card and bring it back when it's time to pay. Scan a QR or barcode inside, say, OpenTable, pay with Apple Pay inside the app and you're done.
The prospect of not having to wait for a human to handle your transaction is what mobile payments actually bring to the table, not being able to tap your phone or watch against a reader. And I think retailers are at least considering that as a possibility as evidenced by what Target and Walmart are doing; if they can get people accustomed to using those apps to pay instead of NFC, then an "express" checkout system for those people who would otherwise use the self-checkout machines is not a huge jump.
* "Maybe" because with a properly optimized chip terminal, NFC does not save that much time compared to using the chip. Especially when no PIN or signature's required under $50 anyway regardless of how you use your card.