Apple Pay coming to Australia and Canada

Apple Pay is coming to Canada and Australia later this year thanks to a tie-up with American Express.

  11 1 comment

Apple Pay coming to Australia and Canada

Editorial

This content has been selected, created and edited by the Finextra editorial team based upon its relevance and interest to our community.

CEO Tim Cook revealed the news during the tech giant's fourth quarter earnings call, adding that the service will make its way to Hong Kong, Singapore and Spain in 2016.

Apple Pay, which lets users make online and instore payments with their iPhones and Apple watches, launched in the US last October and arrived in the UK this summer.

In both these markets Apple secured deals with large numbers of issuers and the major card schemes but it appears that customers in the new countries will be limited to American Express, at least initially.

Despite huge initial hype, the service has failed to take off in the States. Research published this week by Phoenix Marketing International suggests that after impressive early adoption, things have stalled.

Apple also faces competition from its fellow tech firms such as Google and Samsung, while this week JPMorgan Chase signalled the beginning of a fightback from banks with the unveiling of its own rival.

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Comments: (1)

A Finextra member 

The challenge in Australia is the cap on merchant fees. With Apple asking for their sizeable cut on every transaction, it would be hard for most issuers to accept that. Amex in Australia has generally been at a higher cost (from memory) and may have more room to absorb the Apple fee. Be very interesting to see how this plays out.

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