Am 10.09.21 um 12:48 schrieb Carlos E. R.:
> That's another one. No, I was talking of an specific bank app that
> replaces the card, and the phone works as if it were the NFC card. Quite
> cumbersome.
>
> 1) Open the phone, identify.
> 2) Open the banking app, identify.
> 3) Line up to pay at the supermarket. Unload your goods into the "belt".
> 4) The bank app has timed out and closed. Open it up again - and it
> takes a few seconds to respond after identification.
> 5) People in the line get politely restless.
> 6) Fiddle with the cashier machine reading the phone - there is no
> marking to say where the antena is in both devices; some times it works,
> some times it doesn't; even a machine at the same supermarket will work,
> the next will not.
> 7) Apologize and use the card.

Not very competitive and appealing.

> I was using the phone because the bank asked us to try.>
> So the fact is I see very few people use the phone to pay, and obviously
> I don't know what app they use - I saw *one* young man yesterday using
> it. Happened to be a supermarket staff doing a purchase - maybe they
> have a staff app?
>
> Me, I would never use Apple/Google pay and give them even more data;
> only in case of last resort.

There will be no last resort ...
Neither Apple nor Google will succeed outside the US exactely because of
the resons you mentioned. Most people want to do the business directly
with their bank and the merchant. Credit card companies and hardware
supppliers slow things down and make it unnecessarily expensive and in
paritcular they create no added value. Au contraire.

> Yes, we use a user to user paying app, here Bizum is very popular. Just
> not for paying merchants, initially it was not activated, dunno about now.
>
> https://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bizum
>
>
>> The next step is to internationalise these types of transactions. Apple
>> Pay and Google Pay are very old fashioned and cumbersome.
>
> Certainly, that's the next step.

I read about this project recently. Perhaps in a year or two?

--
De gustibus non est disputandum

Am 10.09.21 um 11:28 schrieb Wilf:
> In the UK, there is currently a £45 limit on contactless card
> transactions. There is no such limit when using Apple Pay contactless
> transactions.

When that started a couple of years ago the limit in Switzerland was CHF
40 per transaction. During the pandemic ist was doubled to CHF 80 which
is the equivalent of £ 65. Absolutely sufficient for grocery shopping
and paying the parking fee.

Entering the PIN on a pad is not relevant from a pandemic point of view
anyway.

And for larger amounts I don't want any device to decide to charge
without my conscious consent (=PIN).

--
De gustibus non est disputandum

Carlos E. R. <robin_listas@es.invalid> wrote:
> That's another one. No, I was talking of an specific bank app that
> replaces the card, and the phone works as if it were the NFC card. Quite
> cumbersome.
>
> 1) Open the phone, identify.
> 2) Open the banking app, identify.
> 3) Line up to pay at the supermarket. Unload your goods into the "belt".
> 4) The bank app has timed out and closed. Open it up again - and it
> takes a few seconds to respond after identification.
> 5) People in the line get politely restless.
> 6) Fiddle with the cashier machine reading the phone - there is no
> marking to say where the antena is in both devices; some times it works,
> some times it doesn't; even a machine at the same supermarket will work,
> the next will not.
> 7) Apologize and use the card.
>
> I was using the phone because the bank asked us to try.

I feel for the horror that you have to go through, but I can only add
the datapoint that here in the Netherlands "everyone" uses the bank
app on their phone for contactless payment and I rarely see anyone
having difficulty with that.

Sensible people do not first grab their phone and then load their goods
onto the belt. They first have all their goods scanned and they grab
and unlock their phone only at the time the cashier is about to announce
the total amount and ask for the method of payment. I think that is
obvious.

Joerg Lorenz <hugybear@gmx.ch> wrote:
> Am 09.09.21 um 19:56 schrieb sms:
>> <https://www.techradar.com/news/barely-anyone-is-using-apple-pay-in-stores-anymore>
>>
>> "New research released Tuesday by PYMNTS.com found that only 6% of
>> shoppers with iPhones in the US had used the platform to pay for their
>> in-store purchases at some point in the past year."
>>
>> They don't talk about Google Pay or Samsung Pay but I suspect that the
>> numbers are even lower for those systems, see
>> <https://www.statista.com/statistics/722213/user-base-of-leading-digital-wallets-nfc/>.
>> Even though there are a lot more Android devices in the world than iOS
>> devices, Apple Pay has more users than Google Pay and Samsung Pay
>> combined (and many of the Samsung Pay users are probably also part of
>> the Google Pay number and vice-versa).
>
> They have no added value compared to debit- or a credit-card with a chip
> and/or NFC-functionality.

They allow you to spend more than the £45/€45 contactless limit.

Also most people always carry their phone but not necessarily always their
wallet so you always have a payment with you.

> Nobody needs these services. The last firgure for Europe I can remember
> is that all these services combined add up to less than 1% of all
> transactions.

In the UK cash is massively on the wane, <10%, and according to this
pre-pandemic report Apple pay et al contributed 11% of all contactless
payments.
https://www.mobiletransaction.org/contactless-payments-uk/

Am 10.09.21 um 11:31 schrieb Andy Burns:
> Wilf wrote:
>
>> In the UK, there is currently a £45 limit on contactless card
>> transactions.
>
> Which will raise to £100 from 15th October.

Very good! So there is hope it will go up further here too. CHF 150
would cover almost everything in daily life.

>> There is no such limit when using Apple Pay contactless
>> transactions.
>
> There is no such limit with my bank's contactless app (although I
> suspect it requires PIN/fingerprint as additional proof of id).

Really no obstacle.

--
De gustibus non est disputandum

Am 10.09.21 um 00:22 schrieb Savageduck:
> I use ApplePay via my Apple Watch for the bulk of my bricks&mortar shopping, with the exception of Walmart, which has become an inconvenience. Also these days a good percentage of my online shopping also uses ApplePay, usually completed with a double click on the Apple Watch.

> I have been using ApplePay outside of the USA for over 5 years, including almost impossibly in South Africa. The contactless POS terminal seems to be the key to acceptance, along with convenience, and security, the key to usage.

User-Agent: Hogwasher/5.24

Pls teach your Hogwasher to shorten the line to 72 characters.
The above is unreadable. Is Hogwasher not able to adhere to any long
existing standards?

--
De gustibus non est disputandum

On 10/09/2021 13.31, Rob wrote:
> Carlos E. R. <robin_listas@es.invalid> wrote:
>> That's another one. No, I was talking of an specific bank app that
>> replaces the card, and the phone works as if it were the NFC card. Quite
>> cumbersome.
>>
>> 1) Open the phone, identify.
>> 2) Open the banking app, identify.
>> 3) Line up to pay at the supermarket. Unload your goods into the "belt".
>> 4) The bank app has timed out and closed. Open it up again - and it
>> takes a few seconds to respond after identification.
>> 5) People in the line get politely restless.
>> 6) Fiddle with the cashier machine reading the phone - there is no
>> marking to say where the antena is in both devices; some times it works,
>> some times it doesn't; even a machine at the same supermarket will work,
>> the next will not.
>> 7) Apologize and use the card.
>>
>> I was using the phone because the bank asked us to try.
>
> I feel for the horror that you have to go through, but I can only add
> the datapoint that here in the Netherlands "everyone" uses the bank
> app on their phone for contactless payment and I rarely see anyone
> having difficulty with that.
>
> Sensible people do not first grab their phone and then load their goods
> onto the belt. They first have all their goods scanned and they grab
> and unlock their phone only at the time the cashier is about to announce
> the total amount and ask for the method of payment. I think that is
> obvious.

Obviously :-)

But I'm very sensitive to holding the line up while I open the bank app
and enter the long pin, then wait for the app to connect to the server
and say "ready". Can be up to a minute, thus I do this while waiting in
the line.

Surely that's the fault of this particular bank (I tried two) software
programmers and server handling, but meanwhile... Maybe the next phone
will work better. I don't have friends that use the phone to pay, can't
ask. They also prefer using the card directly for whatever reason.

That the phone is reluctant to connect to the terminal can be the phone
fault or the terminal fault, I don't know. I'm not going to purchase
another phone till forced to. I fear it would be the same hassle with
Apple/Google pay. But as Joerg Lorenz say, why put up with another
intermediary that will gloat with having the data of the purchase
history of millions of clients?

--
Cheers,
Carlos E.R.

On 10/09/2021 13.36, Joerg Lorenz wrote:
> Am 10.09.21 um 11:31 schrieb Andy Burns:
>> Wilf wrote:
>>
>>> In the UK, there is currently a £45 limit on contactless card
>>> transactions.
>>
>> Which will raise to £100 from 15th October.
>
> Very good! So there is hope it will go up further here too. CHF 150
> would cover almost everything in daily life.

I prefer lower...

--
Cheers,
Carlos E.R.

On 10/09/2021 13.34, Chris wrote:
> Joerg Lorenz <hugybear@gmx.ch> wrote:
>> Am 09.09.21 um 19:56 schrieb sms:
>>> <https://www.techradar.com/news/barely-anyone-is-using-apple-pay-in-stores-anymore>
>>>
>>> "New research released Tuesday by PYMNTS.com found that only 6% of
>>> shoppers with iPhones in the US had used the platform to pay for their
>>> in-store purchases at some point in the past year."
>>>
>>> They don't talk about Google Pay or Samsung Pay but I suspect that the
>>> numbers are even lower for those systems, see
>>> <https://www.statista.com/statistics/722213/user-base-of-leading-digital-wallets-nfc/>.
>>> Even though there are a lot more Android devices in the world than iOS
>>> devices, Apple Pay has more users than Google Pay and Samsung Pay
>>> combined (and many of the Samsung Pay users are probably also part of
>>> the Google Pay number and vice-versa).
>>
>> They have no added value compared to debit- or a credit-card with a chip
>> and/or NFC-functionality.
>
> They allow you to spend more than the £45/€45 contactless limit.
>
> Also most people always carry their phone but not necessarily always their
> wallet so you always have a payment with you.

Non issue for me.

I have forgotten the phone more times than the wallet.

And considering that the wallet also contains the ID card and the
driving license, and driving without that is a fine, there is barely
that risk here.

--
Cheers,
Carlos E.R.

Carlos E. R. <robin_listas@es.invalid> wrote:
> On 10/09/2021 13.34, Chris wrote:
>> Joerg Lorenz <hugybear@gmx.ch> wrote:
>>> Am 09.09.21 um 19:56 schrieb sms:
>>>> <https://www.techradar.com/news/barely-anyone-is-using-apple-pay-in-stores-anymore>
>>>>
>>>> "New research released Tuesday by PYMNTS.com found that only 6% of
>>>> shoppers with iPhones in the US had used the platform to pay for their
>>>> in-store purchases at some point in the past year."
>>>>
>>>> They don't talk about Google Pay or Samsung Pay but I suspect that the
>>>> numbers are even lower for those systems, see
>>>> <https://www.statista.com/statistics/722213/user-base-of-leading-digital-wallets-nfc/>.
>>>> Even though there are a lot more Android devices in the world than iOS
>>>> devices, Apple Pay has more users than Google Pay and Samsung Pay
>>>> combined (and many of the Samsung Pay users are probably also part of
>>>> the Google Pay number and vice-versa).
>>>
>>> They have no added value compared to debit- or a credit-card with a chip
>>> and/or NFC-functionality.
>>
>> They allow you to spend more than the £45/€45 contactless limit.
>>
>> Also most people always carry their phone but not necessarily always their
>> wallet so you always have a payment with you.
>
> Non issue for me.
>
> I have forgotten the phone more times than the wallet.
>
> And considering that the wallet also contains the ID card and the
> driving license, and driving without that is a fine, there is barely
> that risk here.

The UK doesn't do ID cards and you don't need to have your drivers licence
on you when driving, so going out with just your phone is not a problem.

Carlos E. R. <robin_listas@es.invalid> wrote:
> But as Joerg Lorenz say, why put up with another
> intermediary that will gloat with having the data of the purchase
> history of millions of clients?

Sure. I think "almost nobody" uses those payment services here, that
is mostly an American thing. Just like we do not use PayPal.

Joerg Lorenz <hugybear@gmx.ch> wrote:
> Neither Apple nor Google will succeed outside the US exactely because of
> the resons you mentioned. Most people want to do the business directly
> with their bank and the merchant. Credit card companies and hardware
> supppliers slow things down and make it unnecessarily expensive and in
> paritcular they create no added value. Au contraire.

Well, actually here (Netherlands) you would not do business directly
with the merchant in this case. The payment terminals communicate with
a local payment provider (a company with status similar to a bank) which
processes your payment and communicates with your bank. The merchant
only gets the total paid amount for that day, not the transaction
details of your transaction. So they have no way to track you based
on your transaction and details they may get from the payment (like
your account number or card number). And the bank gets only the payment
requests from the payment provider and have no way to link that to your
particular purchase.
So privacy is actually quite good in this case. Nobody gets the
information to track your purchases, unless you provide the merchant with
other identifying information (like a shop discount card).

On 10/09/2021 14.47, Rob wrote:
> Carlos E. R. <robin_listas@es.invalid> wrote:
>> But as Joerg Lorenz say, why put up with another
>> intermediary that will gloat with having the data of the purchase
>> history of millions of clients?
>
> Sure. I think "almost nobody" uses those payment services here, that
> is mostly an American thing. Just like we do not use PayPal.
>

Paypal I use :-)

But very little, with some internet purchases in which a debit/credit
card is not an option for something. Perhaps when paying in dollars
because the exchange is more convenient than what my bank does. Not even
once a month.

--
Cheers,
Carlos E.R.

"sms" <scharf.steven@geemail.com> wrote

| Agreed. Anyone not using mobile wallet, whether Apple Pay, Google Pay,
| or Samsung Pay, is standing in he way of human progress.
|

We're not all paraplegics. I find it very convenient to
reach into my pocket and pull out a wad of bills. And it's
more private. And I'm not paying some middleman
company for the privilege of making a transaction. Cash
is already an abstraction device. You're adding another
superfluous level, creating an extra level of bloodsucking
middleman. And why? Because you're afraid to carry cash?
You'd lose a lot less being robbed of $200 than being robbed
of your iPhone/iWatch.

What I often see is debit card usage. Again, that's a
sucker's game. Their bank pays a fee because they can't
bother to use cash. We all pay for that. (If it weren't
for idiots using debit cards, a Starbucks coffee could be
only $19.22 instead of $19.87. :)

There are a growing
number of places that are legislating a requirement to
accept cash in the US. But some companies are trying to
defeat that. Whole Foods under Bezos keeps trying various
tricks. The latest is to bring in self-checkout with no cash
allowed. ("Because there's a national coin shortage.")

I'm curious about the numbers with cash back. Last I
heard, AmEx was charging 4% to merchants and MC/Visa
were charging 1.2-2%. So 3% cash back doesn't add up.
Is it only applying to specific purchases? I'm guessing that
if it's worth their while they must be doing something like
selling your personal data to make it actually pay off. Maybe
they have some kind of mutual-parasite arrangement with
Apple, pooling their tracking data and then selling that
on to advertisers and data sales companies.... Or maybe
they just figured that anyone sucker enough to buy an
iPhone and iWatch is just by definition a gold mine. They
want to make sure you're a happy customer when they
come out with a $1,500 Apple iJockstrap that warns you
if the temperature is getting too high for sperm to mature.
And of course, you'll be able to pay just by doing a "Latin
thrust" toward the cash register. That should be fun. :)

AJL <noemail@none.com> wrote:
> On 9/9/2021 12:54 PM, Frank Slootweg wrote:

FWIW, while it's implicity indicated by the (double) quote level, I
didn't write this, but sms <scharf.steven@geemail.com> did.

> >> It [mobile payment] is safer, since if I lose my phone no one is
> >> likely to be able to get into the phone to use mobile payment.
>
> Not necessarily safer here. If I lose my credit card I can put an
> immediate stop on it using my bank's phone app. If I don't know I lost
> it the first charge will notify me by text and I can then stop it. And
> finally I'm not responsible for any fraudulent charges anyway.
>
> >> One annoying thing in the U.S. is that using mobile wallet in a
> >> sit-down restaurant it is often not easy
>
> Not annoying here with a credit card. And when the server carries it
> away I immediately know if the charge is right because of the credit
> card notification text.
>
> >> don't bring a mobile terminal to your table.
>
> One local restaurant I frequent has a terminal sitting on the table all
> the time. It plays games too. I like it because I don't have to wait for
> the server when I'm done. Just plug in the credit card and go.

"AJL" <noemail@none.com> wrote

| > Still more convenient to wave the phone at it.
| | I still have to dig either one out of a pocket to wave it. YMMV...
|

I happen to have some amazing arthritis cream that I
think both of you will want. Rub it on twice a day and
you'll be able to wave a phone OR a card. After two weeks
you'll be able to pick up a fork! Money back guarantee!
But wait! There's more! Does your wife complain that
your shriveled fingers feel like sandpaper? Order now and
you get a free trial bottle of Slick 'n Hot (R) cream. The
special combination of silicone and oil of wintergreen will
have her purring and pouring your Ensure for you!

Now, if you'll just give me your credit card numbers...
You can also send cash.

"Carlos E. R." <robin_listas@es.invalid> wrote

| >> He still has to count the 82 cents :-P
| >
| > if he can't count change, he shouldn't be a cashier.
| >
| | Not if nobody uses cash and they use juniors instead of experienced
| workers. That's the point of the anecdote :-P
|

Thank goodness that we can stop educating people.
Schools are such a moneypit. And math is just too silly.

On 10/09/2021 14.53, Rob wrote:
> Joerg Lorenz <hugybear@gmx.ch> wrote:
>> Neither Apple nor Google will succeed outside the US exactely because of
>> the resons you mentioned. Most people want to do the business directly
>> with their bank and the merchant. Credit card companies and hardware
>> supppliers slow things down and make it unnecessarily expensive and in
>> paritcular they create no added value. Au contraire.
>
> Well, actually here (Netherlands) you would not do business directly
> with the merchant in this case. The payment terminals communicate with
> a local payment provider (a company with status similar to a bank) which
> processes your payment and communicates with your bank. The merchant
> only gets the total paid amount for that day, not the transaction
> details of your transaction. So they have no way to track you based
> on your transaction and details they may get from the payment (like
> your account number or card number). And the bank gets only the payment
> requests from the payment provider and have no way to link that to your
> particular purchase.
> So privacy is actually quite good in this case. Nobody gets the
> information to track your purchases, unless you provide the merchant with
> other identifying information (like a shop discount card).

I see in my receipts the brand name of the card (mastercard, visa, etc),
the last four digits of the card, that it was contactless, and some
serial numbers.

And if I do a return of the goods, they pay to the same card, so somehow
the system can identify the card.

--
Cheers,
Carlos E.R.

Chris <ithinkiam@gmail.com> wrote:
> Frank Slootweg <this@ddress.is.invalid> wrote:
> > sms <scharf.steven@geemail.com> wrote:
> >> <https://www.techradar.com/news/barely-anyone-is-using-apple-pay-in-stores-anymore>
> >>
> >> "New research released Tuesday by PYMNTS.com found that only 6% of
> >> shoppers with iPhones in the US had used the platform to pay for their
> >> in-store purchases at some point in the past year."
> >>
> >> They don't talk about Google Pay or Samsung Pay but I suspect that the
> >> numbers are even lower for those systems, see
> >> <https://www.statista.com/statistics/722213/user-base-of-leading-digital-wallets-nfc/>.
> >> Even though there are a lot more Android devices in the world than iOS
> >> devices, Apple Pay has more users than Google Pay and Samsung Pay
> >> combined (and many of the Samsung Pay users are probably also part of
> >> the Google Pay number and vice-versa).
> >>
> >> This 6% number surprised me since in my area paying with your phone
> >> appears to be at a much higher level than 6%, But I live in Silicon
> >> Valley where people are more tech-savvy.
> >>
> >> The increase in contactless credit cards has apparently been responsible
> >> for the general lack of interest in paying with a phone.
> >
> > Or the 'increase' in contactless debit cards. In our country (NL) -
> > and probably in the most of Europe - there is very little 'increase',
> > because it's already close to 100%.
> >
> >> Personally I use Apple Pay, Google Pay, or Samsung Pay, whenever
> >> possible, for multiple reasons:
> >>
> >> 1. I have a Visa card that pays 3% cash back on mobile wallet purchases,
> >> but the highest cash-back physical card I have pays only 2% cash back.
> >>
> >> 2. At least on my Samsung phone, mobile payment with Google Pay and
> >> Samsung Pay is faster than fishing a credit card out my wallet. The
> >> iPhone is a bit of a pain right now due to mask requirements in stores,
> >> though I could always use my Apple Watch.
> >>
> >> 3. I don't need to carry so many cards in my wallet.
> >>
> >> 4. It is safer, since if I lose my phone no one is likely to be able to
> >> get into the phone to use mobile payment.
> >>
> >> Samsung Pay is especially nice, since as
> >> <https://www.pymnts.com/apple-pay-tracker/2021/7-years-later-6pct-people-with-iphones-in-us-use-apple-pay-in-store/>
> >>
> >> states, 70% of merchants support Apple Pay, which leaves 30% that do
> >> not. A couple of times a month I end up using Samsung Pay at a merchant
> >> that doesn't support Apple Pay or Google Pay (just happened on September
> >> 6th 2021).
> >>
> >> When I was in Europe and China in 2019, mobile wallet payment seemed to
> >> be the default, though in China it was only AliPay and WeChat Pay, there
> >> was no place I went that took Apple Pay, Google Pay, or Samsung Pay. I
> >> went into the Apple Store in Shanghai, but I didn't buy anything, I
> >> suppose that they probably took Apple Pay.
> >
> > As far as Europe is concerned: That was your experience as a
> > *visitor*. For locals, (Apple/Google/Samsung) mobile wallet payment is a
> > minority, because we already had pay-by-phone before Apple/Google/Samsung
> > came to Europe.
>
> We did? How did we pay for a pint/litre milk with only our phones before
> A/G/S pay?

Yes, 'we' (NL and I'm sure most other European countries), had
pay-by-phone apps, before A/G/S pay. These apps were developed by the
banks and work between different banks.

As Joerg mentioned, we also have peer-to-peer payments. For example I
can send a payment to or request a payment from another person/entity by
only specifying their mobile number, i.e. like a SMS or IM (for example
WhatsApp) message. I don't have to know the other parties (IBAN) bank
account number. (The system also allows for non-mobile (for example
computer) to mobile payments/requests.) And being Dutch, we of course
have a system for splitting/sharing bills! :-)

> > Of course *merchants* will *accept* as many payment
> > methods as is possible/feasible without too much cost (for them).
>
> They all work using the same contactless technology so there's nothing they
> merchant needs to do once they do contactless.

I'm sure that beside hardware - i.e. NFC - there's also software
involved, with the latter being different for different payment systems.

> > For most Europeans, Apple/Google/Samsung Pay is a solution waiting for
> > a problem. *Some* might use it, because they travel outside Europe, or
> > want to be 'flash' (I.e. like having an AMEX CC in the old days. :-)).
> >
> >> One annoying thing in the U.S. is that using mobile wallet in a sit-down
> >> restaurant it is often not easy since unlike in Europe they generally
> >> don't bring a mobile terminal to your table.
> >
> > You've been to too expensive restaurants (see AMEX CC above)! :-) In
> > normal restaurants, mobile terminals are quite common. Used one just
> > yesterday.
>
> He meant that in the US they don't have mobile terminals in restaurants
> like we do on this side of the pond. Makes paying for your a meal more of a
> pain.

Yep. Sloppy reading on my part, I missed the 'unlike' bit.

BTW, the 'mobile terminal' I used the other day just had the size of a
smallish smartphone and perhaps even *was* a smallish smartphone. AFAIK,
it hadn't a card slot/reader, just the NFC display area.

On Sep 10, 2021, Mayayana wrote
> Thank goodness that we can stop educating people.
> Schools are such a moneypit. And math is just too silly.

Especially all that fancy new math nowadays.

Ron, the humblest guy in town.

In article <shfmih$vfv$1@dont-email.me>, Mayayana
<mayayana@invalid.nospam> wrote:

> I'm curious about the numbers with cash back. Last I
> heard, AmEx was charging 4% to merchants and MC/Visa
> were charging 1.2-2%. So 3% cash back doesn't add up.

transaction fees are negotiable, including amex, which is competitive
with mc/v and not 4%.

cards that offer higher cash back are usually limited in various ways,
such as dollar amount or time period. for example, 3% for the first
year, 2% after that, or 5% for up to $1500 in purchases ($75 cash
back), 1% after that.

> Is it only applying to specific purchases?

many cards have higher rewards only for specific categories, 1% for
'everything else'.

> I'm guessing that
> if it's worth their while they must be doing something like
> selling your personal data to make it actually pay off.

almost all cards do that and have done so since forever.

> Maybe
> they have some kind of mutual-parasite arrangement with
> Apple, pooling their tracking data and then selling that
> on to advertisers and data sales companies....

apple pay is just a conduit. apple does not get any transaction data.
that's entirely between the cardholder, the merchant and the bank, the
same as it's always been, except that the merchant doesn't get the
cardholder's name/address with apple pay, which means they *can't*
market purchase data. the bank still can (and does), which is not new.

however, the apple credit card is one of the only cards to *not* sell
customer purchase data.

> Or maybe
> they just figured that anyone sucker enough to buy an
> iPhone and iWatch is just by definition a gold mine. They
> want to make sure you're a happy customer when they
> come out with a $1,500 Apple iJockstrap that warns you
> if the temperature is getting too high for sperm to mature.
> And of course, you'll be able to pay just by doing a "Latin
> thrust" toward the cash register. That should be fun. :)

that's quite an imagination.

On 10/09/2021 14:27, Mayayana wrote:
> "sms" <scharf.steven@geemail.com> wrote
>
> | Agreed. Anyone not using mobile wallet, whether Apple Pay, Google Pay,
> | or Samsung Pay, is standing in he way of human progress.
> |
>
> We're not all paraplegics. I find it very convenient to
> reach into my pocket and pull out a wad of bills. And it's
> more private. And I'm not paying some middleman
> company for the privilege of making a transaction. Cash
> is already an abstraction device. You're adding another
> superfluous level, creating an extra level of bloodsucking
> middleman. And why? Because you're afraid to carry cash?
> You'd lose a lot less being robbed of $200 than being robbed
> of your iPhone/iWatch.

Cash is outdated.

You're essentially manually moving your money from your account via an
ATM to your pocket. Then when you buy something you hand the cash to the
merchant, they put it in their till, and then at the end of the day/week
have to carry it to their bank to deposit into their account.

Digital paymants are direct from your account to their account.

Without cash, businesses don't have to worry about theft or fraud.

> What I often see is debit card usage. Again, that's a
> sucker's game. Their bank pays a fee because they can't
> bother to use cash. We all pay for that. (If it weren't
> for idiots using debit cards, a Starbucks coffee could be
> only $19.22 instead of $19.87. :)

All cards have fees. Credit cards are much higher, especially in the US
hence how the can afford to provide so much cashback. In Europe where
the fees are capped there are almost no cashback cards [1], so our
coffees are cheaper... :^)

Amex is the most generous here with 1% cashbach but you have to spend
£10,000 a year to get it. Many places don't take Amex.

> There are a growing
> number of places that are legislating a requirement to
> accept cash in the US. But some companies are trying to
> defeat that. Whole Foods under Bezos keeps trying various
> tricks. The latest is to bring in self-checkout with no cash
> allowed. ("Because there's a national coin shortage.")
>
> I'm curious about the numbers with cash back. Last I
> heard, AmEx was charging 4% to merchants and MC/Visa
> were charging 1.2-2%. So 3% cash back doesn't add up.
> Is it only applying to specific purchases?

They also make money from charging interest.

Carlos E. R. <robin_listas@es.invalid> wrote:
> On 10/09/2021 04.34, Your Name wrote:
> > On 2021-09-09 18:35:36 +0000, Wilf said:
> >> On 09/09/2021 at 18:56, sms wrote:
> >>> <https://www.techradar.com/news/barely-anyone-is-using-apple-pay-in-stores-anymore>
>
>
> >> They are missing out in that case, since Apple Pay is so convenient to
> >> use ... on public transport systems here in London too.
> >
> > Within the last week or so here in New Zealand there was an outage by
> > one of the multi-ISP server companies which meant nobody could use Apple
> > / Google Pay in the shops. This week there has been a three-day (so far)
> > outage of internet banking for at leat one of the big banks.
> >
> > Banks here no longer accept cheques. Even before Covid some places (such
> > as buses) were reluctant to accept cash. It really makes you wnoder how
> > people will be expected to be able to buy anything when there are
> > infrastructure issues causing these electronic gimmicks become useless.
>
> Buses here use preloaded/prepaid specific cards, different one per city.

Here (NL) we have one preloaded/prepaid (can be automatically topped
up) card for all public transport (bus, tram, metro, train, <whatever>)
in the whole country.

> At least where I tried. Those are not affected by internet outages.

I assume ours are not affected by mobile/Internet outages, provided
there's enough credit on the card, but I've not experienced such
outages, other than that the check-in/check-out machines were out of
order, in case you travel for free.

> Funnily, in my city we load the card paying the driver with paper money :-D

Ours can be topped up in special machines in many places, but can also
be topped up automatically if you have an account. We use the latter.

> Phones can not be used - again in the cities I have used their buses.

AFAIK, there's also a mobile app, but I haven't looked into that. (Too
much of a hassle with - for me - no benefit.) What's bigger/more-akward,
one or two cards or a smartphone?

Carlos E. R. <robin_listas@es.invalid> wrote:
> On 10/09/2021 13.36, Joerg Lorenz wrote:
> > Am 10.09.21 um 11:31 schrieb Andy Burns:
> >> Wilf wrote:
> >>
> >>> In the UK, there is currently a £45 limit on contactless card
> >>> transactions.
> >>
> >> Which will raise to £100 from 15th October.
> >
> > Very good! So there is hope it will go up further here too. CHF 150
> > would cover almost everything in daily life.
>
> I prefer lower...

Well, with less than 150 Swiss Francs you can't buy anything! :-)
(Just kidding.)

Here (NL) the limit is settable, The default was EUR 25 and was raised
to EUR 50 during the pandemic. EUR 50 is fine by me ... ummm ... I mean
for SWMBO! :-)

On 09/10/2021 01:12 AM, John B. wrote:
> On Thu, 9 Sep 2021 22:59:16 -0700, The Real Bev <bashley101@gmail.com>
> wrote:
>
>>On 09/09/2021 03:10 PM, sms wrote:
>>> On 9/9/2021 1:06 PM, badgolferman wrote:
>>>
>>> <snip>
>>>
>>>> I used cash at McDonald’s the other day for coffee. The cost was $1.18 and
>>>> I handed the guy $2.00. He had to have someone help him count out the
>>>> change.
>>>
>>> When I was 16 I had a job at McDonald's while I started out making
>>> milkshakes, they soon found out that I knew how to figure out sales tax
>>> and make change. Back then, the mechanical cash registers didn't tell
>>> you how much change to give out, or calculate sales tax. At least back
>>> then there was no fractional sales taxes, it was a flat 4% for the State
>>> with nothing for the city or county or transit agency.
>>
>>My 16-YO job was selling stuff at Sears. We not only had to figure the
>>3% sales tax in our head, we had to add up the customer's bill with
>>pencil and paper and ring the total up on the cash register. AND make
>>change. AND be able to answer questions about the merchandise. I felt
>>really strange advising grandmothers about their towel and doily
>>purchases :-)
>>
>>> When I worked at a department store at 17, part of the hiring process
>>> was taking a math test.
>>
>>Yes. And 'training' was a whole day, mostly devoted to the Sears
>>Revolving Charge (the equivalent of paying the minimum monthly payment
>>until everything was paid off): you had to make a phone call to get
>>authorization for the charge to be added, which generally took perhaps
>>10 minutes. I was never able to understand why people would pay
>>ridiculous interest on a $5 purchase.
>
> I remember buying a packet of faucet washers at Sears, 7-1/2 cents or
> something like that, and the girl at the cask register says, "Will
> that be cash or charge?"

There were two forms of charge: The first you were expected to pay in
full every month at no additional cost; the second was the revolving
charge I described above. The revolving charge was clearly highly
profitable.

--
Cheers, Bev
"I don't care who your father is! Drop that cross
one more time and you're out of the parade!"