Apple Pay went live in Australia last year, but it was limited in terms of credit cards accepted, which was limited to American Express for a while. Apparently Apple had a hard time trying to get banks on board with Apple Pay, and it was only a couple of months ago that Apple finally convinced ANZ to adopt their platform.
The idea was that hopefully other banks would follow suit, but interestingly enough it seems to have had a different reaction. It turns out that the three big banks in Australia – NAB, Commonwealth, and Westpac have asked Australia’s competition regulator permission to join forces and collectively boycott Apple Pay, at least until they can collectively negotiate some kind of deal.
Basically the banks feel like Apple is trying to muscle in on a feature that they themselves have been trying to get consumers to adopt. Also for now, Apple has prevented third-party apps from accessing the NFC on the iPhones, meaning that even if the banks were to create their own mobile payments app, it wouldn’t work.
There is also the concern over security of Apple Pay following the spike in credit card fraud in the US after Apple Pay had been launched. It sounds like the Australian market is giving Apple a pretty hard time with Apple Pay, meaning that users in Australia will probably have to a wait a little longer if they want to use the feature, but we suppose ultimately this is for your own good as well.
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