Never happened to me but I've only been using Apple Pay since 31st March 2016. Most uses have been with my AmEx card, small number with a Visa Barclaycard. Every one has gone through quickly and easily.
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Apple Pay: Yes or No?
- Thread starter daniel1948
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The entire key to your post is the first clause "In the beginning". That was a long time ago -- caused by a bank or two, not by Apple. Those days are over and Apple Pay is a smoothly functioning machine. Moreover, even when it happened -- yes, in the beginning -- , its not like anyone got stuck with the charges.
Have no fear, Apple Pay is here. Use it.
My major credit-card uses are grocery shopping, airline tickets, booking adventure travel, phone and utility bills, and shopping at small locally-owned places. None of these take ApplePay. I agree that AP is a great idea and safer than using the credit card. But the above list down't include any places that I shop at. It looks like a long list, but it's really a minuscule number compared to all the places that accept credit cards.
And FWIW, the fingerprint reader seems kind of wonky: I set it up for three fingers, and then it quits accepting them one at a time, and I have to be continually deleting and re-setting them. It's easier just to use a passcode!
I'll use ApplePay as soon as any of the stores I shop at starts accepting it.
But I'm not holding my breath.My major credit-card uses are grocery shopping, airline tickets, booking adventure travel, phone and utility bills, and shopping at small locally-owned places. None of these take ApplePay. I agree that AP is a great idea and safer than using the credit card. But the above list down't include any places that I shop at. It looks like a long list, but it's really a minuscule number compared to all the places that accept credit cards.
And FWIW, the fingerprint reader seems kind of wonky: I set it up for three fingers, and then it quits accepting them one at a time, and I have to be continually deleting and re-setting them. It's easier just to use a passcode!
I'll use ApplePay as soon as any of the stores I shop at starts accepting it.
I'm very surprised no small locally-owned places you shop at accept it. Remember, even if they don't know they do, any* contactless-enabled terminal accepts it. Many of the countertop terminals small businesses use have contactless enabled. Generally, they don't even know it or know how to use it. They have to press sale and enter the amount FIRST then the contactless logo shows up on screen. This is true of several common countertop terminals including the VX520 and FD130.
*that's the theory. The reality is Apple Pay has some major compatibility issues that result in it not working some places that contactless cards work fine, and contactless cards themselves have compatibility issues, where some brands and card types don't work while others work fine.
My major credit-card uses are grocery shopping, airline tickets, booking adventure travel, phone and utility bills, and shopping at small locally-owned places. None of these take ApplePay. I agree that AP is a great idea and safer than using the credit card. But the above list down't include any places that I shop at. It looks like a long list, but it's really a minuscule number compared to all the places that accept credit cards.
And FWIW, the fingerprint reader seems kind of wonky: I set it up for three fingers, and then it quits accepting them one at a time, and I have to be continually deleting and re-setting them. It's easier just to use a passcode!
I'll use ApplePay as soon as any of the stores I shop at starts accepting it.
I'm not sure why you're having such trouble with your fingerprint reader. It's either faulty hardware, or maybe you have unusual fingerprints. I've never had a problem with my Touch ID. At most I may rarely have to try a second time when my fingers have contacted the pad at a strange angle the first time.
I would suggest you take it to an Apple Store and have them check it. It's possible if you have some unusual fingerprints you won't be able to use the Touch ID reliably.
However, Pay can be used with a passcode only. And for my money, even with a passcode, improves most credit card transactions, not to mention making them more secure -- for me. I will say that in particular at one store I frequent, Trader Joe's, Pay is ridiculously faster than using the chip reader (which is my only choice with my credit cards), something I find to be true in various degrees with all chip readers over swiping (which is no longer an option).
For me, Pay is a convenient option. No reason not to enable it, and use it when applicable (I would use it at Trader Joes if no where else just to speed up the payment process). I have to carry my drivers license and wallet anyway, so I always have one credit card in it. But it is the difference as to whether I leave the wallet in my car when running into the grocery store where I can use Pay, or not. Or more importantly when I take a bike ride on a Sunday morning and know that all I have to carry with me is my iPhone because my favorite coffee shop takes it.
These are all personal use scenarios, and as you say you always carry a credit card on your person -- more likely to leave your phone behind (something which for many of us is the reverse). But always better to have options than not.
The chip reader isn't meant to be faster, it's meant to keep cloned magnetic stripes from being used. There are two main reasons for the speed difference:
1. The transaction can't start processing until the amount is known to the terminal. This is also true of contactless in a chip environment. If you insert your card at the beginning, the terminal isn't doing anything until the transaction is totalled. This is why some people think it takes "a minute" (a ridiculous claim I've heard all too often) to process a chip card. It doesn't, it just doesn't start until the cashier hits total and chooses the card option. This will also be true for contactless in a chip environment and helps validate the transaction.
2. Issuer script processing. After the transaction authorisation/decline, the issuing bank is able to send data back to be written to the card. This can be a new PIN number, or even a remote kill of the card.
Visa and now MasterCard have decided they're willing to forego these security features in the US market, and will now allow merchants to begin skipping them if they wish. Visa calls this reduced-security chip mode "Quick Chip" and MasterCard calls it "M/Chip Fast". The main security benefit of chip transactions - a unique transaction-specific cryptogram that cannot be copied - is maintained. Man in the middle attacks, however, will become at least theoretically easier.
These reduced security US-specific Visa and MasterCard chip transactions will potentially feel even faster than contactless EMV transactions, since they'll be able to interact with the card before the total, whereas that can't be done for contactless EMV (places that allow that now are using an older, less secure, contactless mode).
Intentions are all well and good, but get back to me when these things are uniformly implemented at all merchants. Right now it's a mess. And no, the lag I'm talking about is from the time the the cashier initiates the transaction to the time it completes, followed by all of the prompts I have to acknowledge, and then the ultimate insult -- my signature. Not from the point I insert the card. I insert the card before anything else as a convenience to me, so I can forget about it. But guess what, I have to remove the card at a certain point before the process completes, or everything gets held up. Ridiculous.
Pay blows this process away, and likely will no matter how efficient chip and signature becomes.
I've been saying that it needs to be widely accepted at two categories: gas station pumps and grocery stores for the impression that "it's accepted nowhere" to start going away. (Trader Joe's/Whole Foods/Sprouts don't count IMO because of their limited reach and smaller selections compared to Safeway/Kroger/Walmart, while most people seem to not bother going inside gas stations while filling up their cars.) A lot of people simply don't eat out or buy new phones/computers/shoes/clothes/etc. nearly as often either, so those places don't carry much weight.
I shouldn't have to teach merchants how to use their own equipment. If they don't know how to accept Apple Pay and aren't willing to ask about it, acceptance is simply not a high priority for them.
On an objective basis, yeah. But I imagine with implementation of stuff like Quick Chip and general speedups in the chip reading process, it might end up becoming "good enough" for the vast majority of people. As it is now, Apple Pay isn't even considered an option by shoppers; I've seen way more people using the chip/swipe reader at "official" Apple Pay retailers than Apple Pay.
I agree - that's usually the starting point that I share with people who want to use Apple Pay (sadly, there's a lot of places with NFC terminals that have it disabled). That being said, the list is a lot longer for "official" locations than just a year ago and expanding a lot. A lot of phone carriers accept Apple Pay (both officially and unofficially) in their stores, so that could also be an option from your utility standpoint - I think they'd prefer you put your card info in their systems to push autopay. Besides that, a lot of apps are adding support for in-app Apple Pay, and that looks like it may be more in line with some of your purchases. The small, locally-owned places may have NFC enabled and not even know it!
There are rumors that Apple Pay may be added as an option from within web pages in the future, so that may change things a bit, too. The idea appeals to me the same way the in-app version does: I don't have to keep my credit card information on file with the merchant, and the info they have is a device number, as opposed to my real number. This makes it easier in that I don't have to update my payment information if I get a new card, and if there is a data breach, the information is essentially useless.
You could set it up and use it where you can. I suspect it's a technology that will grow slowly and steadily, especially since other vendors are offering NFC-capable phones and the QR-code based payment systems are kind of dead in the water.
You can use it with a passcode, but it sounds like there may be something wrong with your Touch ID sensor in general - I've also found good luck and trying to really cover as much of my finger during the initial set up (moving it around a lot), but that may be a case-by-case sort of thing anyway. Although Touch ID on the 6s/6s Plus is faster and more reliable, the original version of Touch ID is pretty good, so you having those issues might be something else at play.
I almost never buy gas. I drive the stinker on one long trip each summer, up to Canada and back for hiking. Occasionally I drive it to the airport, but recently my local airport has gotten improved taxi service, so that won't be as necessary. Otherwise I drive the EV, which I "fuel up" by plugging it in at home.
I will do this next time I'm there.
I don't carry a wallet. When I travel I use a sort of wallet thingy on a belt. Otherwise I just carry my credit card, driver's license, and some cash in my shirt pocket. I bring my phone when I leave the house, in case of necessity, but I leave it in the car. It's a nuisance to bring it into stores. I probably would if I could use ApplePay, but it's not a habit I have now. Right now, it's more convenient for me to swipe a card
Are there purchase limits with Apple Pay? There is no mention of limits in the U.S. on Apple's ApplePay Help page.
Sometimes small adventure outfitters (and I suppose others) accept credit cards by plugging a magnetic-strip reader into their phone. If they're using an iPhone, will it accept ApplePay by default? I'm guessing not, since the service is provided by a third-party credit-card processor. But do iPhones have the hardware to accept payment as well as make payments via ApplePay?
It all seems like a good idea, but not yet ready for prime time.
I've gotta tell you, you're the exception, not the rule. Maybe Pay is not for up you. You don't buy gas? You leave your phone in the car? Not the norm.
When you say it's not ready for prime time, you mean for you. Pay works great where it works. If your life revolved around a few key stores that took Pay then you'd start leaving the credit card in the car. For most, the credit card is thing they're going to lose somewhere, not the Phone.
Now you're talking about Square card readers, and payments directly to other iPhones. The reality is those card readers are not long for this earth, as chips become the norm. Most are being replaced with devices that do take chips and Pay since the merchant is on the hook for any and all credit card fraud if not. And yes Pay does allow peer to peer money transfers. But that's not the main reason behind it. I don't know how it works because I don't use it.
But talk about not ready for prime time, it's the Chip. The stores I visit now are a mess, some take the chip, some don't. Half my transactions are swipes that redirect me to insert my chip. The clerks are confused, and don't know what they take and what they don't anymore. The chip takes forever because merchant software is incompatible, and then there are all those prompts and finally a signature. The card readers now have an alert tone to remind customers to remove their card to complete the transaction, because customers were forgetting their cards and leaving them behind in the reader. And it's going to get worse before it gets better.
Frankly the sooner I can get rid of credit cards the better for me. Pay is ready now, it's the merchants who are not, but then it's those very same merchants who are not ready for chip and signature either. All I know is my shopping experience is much better with any merchant who accepts Pay. Fortunately the grocery store chain I use accepts it, and that's most of my shopping.
I guess when I said it's not ready for prime time, I meant that there are too few places (if any, I haven't found one yet) that take it here in Spokane.
But next time I use an adventure outfitter that uses the Square card reader, which is in about 3 weeks from now, I'll ask if they can and will accept Apple Pay peer to peer. I do that kind of travel a fair amount. And the place where I get my hair cut uses one of those little hand-held card machines. I'm due for a haircut in the next day or two, and I'll see if they can accept ApplePay.
I do like the idea. I just need to find some place that accepts it.
And, yes, I know I'm not normal for not being tied to my phone: I leave it in the car when I go to a place of business, I NEVER answer it while driving, and I shut off the ringer when I go to bed or take a nap. I also don't answer the phone if I'm talking to someone or have a visitor. Callers can leave a message. That's what voicemail and texting are for. I also know it's not normal to fill my car with electricity rather than stinky gasoline. It's not normal, but it's loads of fun.
But next time I use an adventure outfitter that uses the Square card reader, which is in about 3 weeks from now, I'll ask if they can and will accept Apple Pay peer to peer. I do that kind of travel a fair amount. And the place where I get my hair cut uses one of those little hand-held card machines. I'm due for a haircut in the next day or two, and I'll see if they can accept ApplePay.
I do like the idea. I just need to find some place that accepts it.
And, yes, I know I'm not normal for not being tied to my phone: I leave it in the car when I go to a place of business, I NEVER answer it while driving, and I shut off the ringer when I go to bed or take a nap. I also don't answer the phone if I'm talking to someone or have a visitor. Callers can leave a message. That's what voicemail and texting are for. I also know it's not normal to fill my car with electricity rather than stinky gasoline.
It's not normal, but it's loads of fun.
I do wish that more gas pumps had the capability for Apple Pay (or at least the capability to read EMV chips), especially since skimming has become a big problem in a lot of places - I've been using Apple Pay with the gas pumps at Meijer (a Michigan-based big-box chain that focuses mostly on groceries) and it's been fantastic. They were pushing contactless with their store-branded card for years, so when Apple Pay was introduced, you could use it in their stores and on the gas pumps themselves. Nice that you're able to get by with the EV (In some ways, you're a bit ahead of the curve there!)
Purchase limits are up to your card issuer, but sometimes merchants can add extra requirements. It's much like how you could go spend $50 at a store like Target and then go to Best Buy and get the third-degree for a purchase that's $15. As far as Apple's involvement, they're just providing the mechanism that connects the card issuer to your device's antenna.
Although there might be other brands of magnetic-strip readers, the Square ones are the most common. Currently those can't take Apple Pay and Square is pushing newer ones that can do EMV and NFC. The new reader is $50 and does NFC, EMV, and magnetic-strips: https://squareup.com/contactless-chip-reader At that price, it's much cheaper than many payment terminals that are leased, so I suspect a lot of small businesses will eventually upgrade, at least to get some liability protection when moving towards EMV.
I can appreciate that you have your own way of doing things and it works for you, part of threads like these are that they can offer some ideas for use cases, but not everything will work for everyone, so we can all share some ideas and see if anything matches up.
Whoooopeeee! I got my hair cut today and, thanks to whoever it was above who said that some of those hand-held credit-card machines accept ApplePay, I tried it and it worked! This morning I deleted all my old fingerprints that were not working, and entered them fresh, so there was no problem there. From here on out I'll be more aware of those little readers to try AP on them.