Consumers across the United Arab Emirates will soon be able to make payments across a “variety of services” using their mobile phone and Empay, a common mobile payment platform based on NFC. The solution forms part of Dubai’s Smart Government Initiative which aims to transform Dubai into the world’s smartest city. More
Archive for April 2017
Apple Pay gets positive start in Taiwan
Some 415,000 cards were registered to Apple Pay two days after it launched in Taiwan in March 2017, the Financial Supervisory Commission has revealed... More
Consumers get chance to win prizes at the point of sale
Consumers can now be offered the chance to win prizes related to the purchases they make both in-store and online by playing games such as scratch cards and slot machines that are integrated into a merchant’s payment confirmation pages online and at the payment terminal in a store. More
PayPal and Visa extend payments deal to Asia Pacific
PayPal users across Asia Pacific will soon be able to make in-store NFC mobile payments in all Visa supporting locations, following an announcement by PayPal and Visa that they are to expand their US payments agreement to the region... More
Deutsche Bank customers get HCE mobile payments
Customers of Deutsche Bank in Germany can now make host card emulation (HCE) based mobile payments using their Mastercard credit or debit card through the bank’s Deutsche Bank Mobile app... More
WhatsApp to launch UPI-based payments in India?
Messaging app WhatsApp is exploring India’s Unified Payments Interface (UPI) platform “among other payment modes” for launching a P2P mobile payment service in the country... More
Low uptake of SIM-based mobile payments leads to decrease in NFC SIM shipments in 2016
The global number of NFC SIM card shipments decreased in 2016 due in part to a “lower than anticipated” consumer uptake of SIM-based mobile payments and the impact of the closure of the Softcard mobile wallet in the US, the SIMalliance has revealed, despite reporting growth in NFC SIM shipments in key countries across Europe and the CIS regions, highlighting the demand in specific markets. More
Barclaycard: Realising the potential of conversational commerce is crucial
Having information about how, when and why consumers seek to contact organisations through digital assistants and chatbots and understanding why they are gravitating towards doing so is critical to achieving the full potential of conversational commerce, according to Barclaycard’s managing director of future payments Nick Kerigan and director of future payments Sanjaya Shrestha. More
Samsung Pay opens early access phase in the UAE
Samsung Pay has launched an early access program in the UAE with support from Mastercard and Visa and a number of banks including Mashreq Bank, ADCB, Rakbank, Emirates NBD, Standard Chartered and NBAD... More
Amazon customers get in-store cash deposits to fund online payments
Amazon customers across the US can now top up their Amazon balance using cash at “thousands of participating convenience, grocery and drug stores” by showing a printed barcode or a barcode on their mobile device to the cashier. They will then be able to use the funds to make online purchases at Amazon. More
Twint goes live in Switzerland
Mobile payment service Twint has been launched in Switzerland, marking the completion of the merger between PostFinance’s Twint and financial infrastructure operator SIX’s Paymit platforms... More
Australian banks lose fight to gain access to NFC functionality in Apple iPhones
The group of Australian banks seeking stronger negotiating powers with Apple over the NFC technology within its iPhone handsets have been denied access to it by the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) on the grounds that the proposed conduct would “reduce or distort competition in a number of markets” and that the benefits are “outweighed by the detriments”. More
Samsung Pay expands on online payments plan
Samsung Pay will be available for online payments at “hundreds of thousands of merchants around the world” where Visa Checkout is accepted later this year. The news follows an announcement by the company’s Justin Denison at Samsung Unpacked 2017 last week that the service was heading online through “strategic partnerships”. More