Apple will have to sign up before the launch of its new payment plan which is reported to be announced at the September 9 product event. It was earlier reported that Apple had been in negotiations with Visa which was said to leverage the forthcoming iPhone 6 and a few days back, a logic board leak reported the NFC, near field communications chip, planned for the iPhone 6 which will presumably play a very important role in enabling the functions of mobile payments.
Apple’s new payments system is planned to enable iPhone 6 users to utilise their phones instead of the credit cards, debit cards or cash in order to pay for goods in stores. The consumers could present their phones at the counter at the time of checkout of partnering retailers and transmit payment information to complete the transaction though it is not known which retailers have signed on to accept such type of payments.
Approval from Credit Card Network/Bank
Apple had held discussions with several credit card networks in the lead up to the announcement, regarding the new payment product according to sources. The Information, the news site, had earlier reported that Visa had also agreed to partner with Apple.
The representatives of both Apple as well as American Express refrained from making any comments with regards to this issue. The introduction of the iPhone payment product will end a lot of speculation for Apple, about when it would take advantage of its huge file of hundreds of millions of credit cards from iTunes as well as App Store customers in order to create their own mobile wallet.
According to sources it is said that Apple would need the approval from the credit card network or the bank which issues an Apple customer’s card for the card to get approved for mobile payments.
Secured iPhone Payment System
Since consumers have accepted mobile wallets from Google and consortium of wireless carriers, industry analyst, executive are of the belief that Apple are capable of making it work.
According to industry sources, Apple is of the belief that its iPhone payment system would be as least secured as the traditional payment cards and sources believe that the iPhone Touch ID fingerprint scanner would play a role somewhere in the system which could be either at launch or in the near future. Apple need not re-invest here since many U.S. stores have now started accepting NFC enabled Amex, Visa Paywave, Google Wallet/Mastercard Paypass and several other forms of electronic forms of payment including the typical credit card swipe.
Having an extensive database of credit card numbers which are linked to iTunes Stores account together with updated security technology like the Touch ID built in the iPhone; Apple is firmly positioned to leverage these assets for the adoption of mobile payment. Though efforts would be needed of partnerships with credit card processors and retailers, this seems to be falling into place prior to the next weeks’ media event.
