The proportion of contactless payments made for purchases from vending machines in the US increased from 18% of all transactions in January 2021 to 43% in October 2021, has now reached 48% and “could grow by another 12%” by the end of this year, a new study reveals... More
Merchants in New Zealand can now accept contactless payments on an ordinary Android NFC smartphone using a low-cost software point of sale (sPOS) solution that users will be able to implement without a monthly fee for using the app until January 2024 if transactions are settled to a Bank of New Zealand (BNZ) account... More
Norway, Finland and New Zealand are the three countries closest to becoming cashless societies, followed by Hong Kong, Sweden, Denmark, Switzerland, the UK, Singapore and the Netherlands, according to research published by Merchant Machine... More
The US Department of Agriculture (USDA) is to run a series of pilot schemes to test the use of mobile payments technology to enable citizens entitled to financial support under its Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) to receive benefits and make NFC or QR code payments for eligible purchases on their mobile device... More
Samsung’s new Galaxy Z Fold 4, Galaxy Z Flip 4, Galaxy Watch 5 and Galaxy Watch 5 Pro all offer NFC functionality, while some also include ultra wideband (UWB) capabilities and the phone maker’s own MST magnetic stripe emulation technology... More
Apple Pay has launched in Malaysia with support for Mastercard and Visa cards issued by AmBank, Maybank and Standard Chartered Bank... More
The number of merchants worldwide using software point of sale (sPOS) solutions to accept contactless payments on an ordinary NFC smartphone or tablet will increase from 6m in 2022 to more than 34.5m by 2027, according to Juniper Research... More
Customers of Intesa Sanpaolo bank in Italy with a compatible smartphone can now digitise and add their PagoBancomat payment card to a Huawei Pay digital wallet and use it to make in-store NFC mobile payments... More
Helsinki Regional Transport (HSL) is to introduce validators across the Finnish capital’s bus, tram, train, metro and ferry networks that will enable passengers to pay their fares using their physical or digital contactless debit, credit or transit card or via a QR code... More
More than eight in ten consumers have used “an NFC contactless card or mobile payment wallet” (85%) and contactless payment card usage has increased by 30% over the past two years, according to a survey of consumers in nine countries around the world that has been conducted for the NFC Forum... More
PARTNER NEWS: Dejamobile has become the first software-only contactless POS solution provider to be certified by French bank card association Groupement des Cartes Bancaires (CB), opening the way for merchants to begin piloting the technology for contactless CB card payments acceptance... More
More than 500,000 students at 100 higher education facilities across the USA have now added an NFC-enabled digital campus card to Apple Wallet or Google Pay on their NFC smartphone or smartwatch, according to campus card provider Transact... More
Merchants in the USA including fashion retailers Vince, Burton, G-Star and Scotch & Soda have begun enabling staff to accept in-store contactless payments on iPhones using Apple’s Tap to Pay software point of sale (sPOS) feature... More
Westpac bank in Australia is piloting a software point of sale (sPOS) solution that will enable merchants to accept contactless payments on their Android NFC smartphone or tablet without needing any additional accessories or hardware... More
Rome’s public transport operator Atac is testing the Tap & Go contactless fare payment system already in use on the Italian capital’s subway network on one of the city’s main bus routes prior to implementing it across its entire bus fleet... More
Transport for NSW is to officially launch the digital version of its Opal transit card that enables passengers to pay fares by tapping a reader with their NFC smartphone or smartwatch and to begin trialling a Mobility-as-a-Service (MaaS) app that will let users plan, book and pay for multimodal journeys across both private and public transport services... More
Bay Area Rapid Transit (BART) and the Metropolitan Transportation Commission (MTC) in the San Francisco Bay Area in the USA are rewarding passengers for opting for the digital version of the Clipper stored-value transit card “because global supply chain issues have depleted the inventory of plastic cards”, the MTC says... More
Nearly two-thirds of consumers in Ireland now make contactless payments with a mobile phone, smartwatch or other device (65%) at least once a month compared with an average of just over half of consumers in other countries (55%), a survey has found... More
Apple iPhone users in the US will soon be able to opt to spread payments for purchases made using Apple Pay over a period of six weeks in four equal instalments using a ‘buy now, pay later’ service integrated into Wallet... More
Taxi drivers in Hong Kong can now accept contactless payments on a standard Android NFC smartphone using Visa’s Tap to Phone software point of sale (sPOS) solution... More