The White House has announced that federal payment cards, like the debit cards used by Social Security recipients, will soon be supported by Apple Pay. Such cards are also used to send out benefits to veterans. Users will simply add these cards to the Passbook app on their iPhone and then use Apple Pay like they would with any other debit or credit card.
This announcement came as part of President Obama’s trip to Silicon Valley where he gave a speech at a Cybersecurity summit. Apple Pay will support Direct Express payments and cards issued by GSASmartPay.
More than 87.4 million transactions are accounted for by these payment methods which are valued at $26.4 billion per annum.
After this was announced Apple CEO Tim Cook revealed that come September Apple Pay will be accepted for payments made to the federal government, so federal parks will let visitors make payments using Apple Pay, but there’s still considerable wait for this arrangement to go live.
As far as support for federal payment cards goes those who have them would not have to wait too long. The White House has said that those cards will soon be able to work with Apple Pay.
Come fall, Apple’s payments service will be supported for payments made to the federal government as well.