Apple Pay goes live in Canada, adds two UK banks, coming to Australia on Thursday
On Tuesday Apple officially launched Apple Pay in Canada, simultaneously announcing two more supporting banks in the U.K., and a Thursday debut for the service in Australia.
Image Credit: Peter J. Thompson/National Post
Canadian payments are currently limited to American Express cards, and further exclude co-branded AmEx cards offered by Scotiabank and others. Transactions can be made at any retailer supporting AmEx's wireless payment system however, which includes major chains such as Tim Hortons, Indigo, Staples, Petro Canada, and McDonald's.
Online payments can be made in apps like Uber, Starbucks, Domino's, Groupon, and Priceline.
In the U.K. -- which got Apple Pay in July -- shoppers can now add cards from TSB or Tesco Bank.
Apple revealed the Australian launch date to the Financial Post, but didn't elaborate on any details, such as supporting merchants. As with Canada, though, American Express will be initial local card issuer.
The service will ultimately need to expand beyond AmEx in Canada and Australia, as most people in those countries use cards from other issuers, like Visa or MasterCard.
Apple is planning to bring Apple Pay to Hong Kong, Singapore, and Spain sometime in 2016. While the company has mostly succeeded in getting financial institutions on board with the service, merchant support has been comparatively lackluster. Regions like Canada and Europe are typically better equipped for wireless payments than the U.S. though, which could help.
Image Credit: Peter J. Thompson/National Post
Canadian payments are currently limited to American Express cards, and further exclude co-branded AmEx cards offered by Scotiabank and others. Transactions can be made at any retailer supporting AmEx's wireless payment system however, which includes major chains such as Tim Hortons, Indigo, Staples, Petro Canada, and McDonald's.
Online payments can be made in apps like Uber, Starbucks, Domino's, Groupon, and Priceline.
In the U.K. -- which got Apple Pay in July -- shoppers can now add cards from TSB or Tesco Bank.
Apple revealed the Australian launch date to the Financial Post, but didn't elaborate on any details, such as supporting merchants. As with Canada, though, American Express will be initial local card issuer.
The service will ultimately need to expand beyond AmEx in Canada and Australia, as most people in those countries use cards from other issuers, like Visa or MasterCard.
Apple is planning to bring Apple Pay to Hong Kong, Singapore, and Spain sometime in 2016. While the company has mostly succeeded in getting financial institutions on board with the service, merchant support has been comparatively lackluster. Regions like Canada and Europe are typically better equipped for wireless payments than the U.S. though, which could help.
Comments
Oh well, I've gone this long with a crippled iPhone 6 Plus, I can go on longer....
M.
In the UK if you ignore take away food outlets there are not many other retail outlets apart from a few supermarkets. I don't have take awys so with the limit at 30 pounds l have not had much of a chance to use Apple Pay in shops yet. Years ago cheque guarantee cards had a limit of 50 pounds so why can't we have a more usable limit of say 100 pounds. I might then be able to use ApplePay.
That's not my experience. Pretty much every shop I go into in London has NFC (and therefore Apple Pay) support.
I am not sure but I think if you have an American Bank account that permits ?Pay you can use it at many places in Canada. i seem to remember there was talk of this. NFC terminals are everywhere, but the Banks haven't implemented ?pay.
You can use Apple Pay with an American credit card/bank account. I was in Canada last month and always used Apple Pay at Tim Hortons.
Really?
My experience within London has been the opposite; I think we're close to the point in London where non-NFC terminals are in the minority.
Presumably the major retailers, Boots Pharmacy, Waitrose etc have rolled out their NFC and Apple Pay support nationally.
Again I'm disappointed to read that someone thinks Apple Pay is limited to £30.
I think it will be useful for Apple to display a list of retailers who've updated their systems and support Apple Pay transactions higher than £30.
I'm in Canada this week, I'm going to check it out at Petro Canada service station today (which takes AMEX).
Unfortunately it did not work at Petro Canada. The reader beeped but the transaction did not go through. I tried both my Apple Watch as well as my iPhone 6s. The clerk said it might be that he reader was an older model. I asked him if he had ever seen anyone successfully use the reader as a tap and pay device and he said yes, regularly. I then asked if he had ever seen it used for Apple Pay and he said I had been the first.
So there you go. Going to try and Tim Horton's today