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I dont believe this. You cannot even pay by card in most shops in Austria. The only country in the EU where you need cash almost everywhere now offers Apple Pay? No way.
Apple’s criteria are kinda weird sometimes. They launched apple pay in the US when only 3% of the country’s merchants were accepting contactless payment. Then last year they launched apple pay in Kazakhstan. Of all countries, they chose Kazakhstan. And now it’s Austria with apparently a very low credit card penetration, let alone contactless.
 
What low penetration? I use Apple Pay with boon in Austria on a daily basis and can pay everywhere. Haven’t had to use cash for almost 1.5 years...

Oh, but there was one place where I couldn’t pay with Apple Pay in the last month: the local Apple Store. Oh the irony...
 
What low penetration? I use Apple Pay with boon in Austria on a daily basis and can pay everywhere. Haven’t had to use cash for almost 1.5 years...

Oh, but there was one place where I couldn’t pay with Apple Pay in the last month: the local Apple Store. Oh the irony...
Yeah for Apple contactless payment = apple pay so their stores and premium resellers won’t accept any form of contactless payment until they can officially accept apple pay. That’s why those stores don’t use NFC in Austria, here in Mexico or anywhere else where Apple Pay hasn’t officially launched. Stupid, but true.

As for the low penetration in Austria, that’s why i used the word “apparently”. I always doubted that statement from the first time I read it.
 
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