Apple Sued for Blocking Tap-to-Pay Competitors on iPhone

[BittenAnkles]

If they “open it up” as you say, many card issuers will switch over to their own app to save the transaction fee and pull support for apple pay in favor of their own NFC app. This will leave apple with less and less banks supporting the system and less and less fees which are necessary for Apple to charge to cover the costs of the servers and maintenance of the system. Google doesn’t charge the fee because they use your purchase data and make enough to more tha cover the costs of the servers. Apple doesn’t sell your data so they need the fee. With out the fee Apple Pay fails and there will be a horrible mishmash of bank apps that you will need to navigate to use contactless payment on the iPhone. Something no one wants. There is no problem with apple’s system. This is just an issue with banks not wanting to pay fees, which are necessary to operate the system. Fees that google has chosen to waive in favor of data mining Making apples fees seem unfair by comparison.

I think this is a likely scenario. Payment balkanization isn't going to be better for consumers and won't save merchants any money. I enjoy the ease and privacy that apple pay affords me. Privacy and user experience never seem to matter to the anti-trust zealots. They worship at the alter of "choice" and "competition" as if those are universally beneficial.

 

[Unregistered 4U]

multiple violations of the federal Sherman Act by "tying" Apple Pay to its mobile devices and monopolizing the "tap and pay iOS mobile wallet market."

“monopolizing the iOS mobile wallet market”. They’re also monopolizing the “Mac Applications that are only on the Mac App Store” market and, let us not forget, the “Apple Mac Pro wheels market”. Any market definition that includes the trademarked name of a company’s product is “a product they make” and is an absurd definition for a market.

Doesn’t prevent anyone from bringing forth a lawsuit, of course!

 

[eifelbube]

Not that I am aware of. I think Apple has every right to only allow Apple Pay on their devices.

I doubt Apple is even interested in having AP available on Android if they cannot get .x% from the card issuers.

 

[Unregistered 4U]

Other payment apps are being prevented from accessing the NFC chip to make tap-to-pay payments. Instead, in the case of PayPal, you have to open the PayPal app then have it generate a QR code that you scan. Not as easy and convenient as Apple Pay where you just have to hold your iPhone next to payment terminal.

The PayPal card can be added as a card within the Wallet and can even be made the default form of payment. I mean one CAN generate a QR code if that excites them, but they don’t have to.

 

[IamTimCook]

What’s so bad about opening up the system?

LOL

Europol warns of AndroidPay NFC tap-and-go theft

Europol has warned that they believe criminals are using Android phones to trigger fraudulent NFC tap-and-go payments.

www.mobilepaymentsworld.com

"Prof Woodward said the criminals were probably using Android handsets rather than iPhones because Google did not prevent third-party apps using a device’s NFC chip, but Apple did.

“Apple systems are locked down, but you can typically write code to get at NFC, wi-fi and Bluetooth on Android-based devices,” he said."

 

[ProfessionalFan]

The PayPal card can be added as a card within the Wallet and can even be made the default form of payment. I mean one CAN generate a QR code if that excites them, but they don’t have to.

So basically there are multiple ways to pay on an iPhone after all.

 

[Rogifan]

The only information Apple collects when you use Apple Pay on your Apple device is a query to insure there are sufficient funds or credit.

Google Pay and Samsung Pay take personal and finical information, which they sell to advertisers which is why they don’t charge.

Neither Google nor Samsung will agree to follow Apple’s strict guidelines for privacy and will try to force Apple to lower its standards. Much like Epic is trying to do.

What is your source for this? And Apple doesn’t prevent anyone from using google.com in a browser. In fact Google pays Apple billions every year to be the default search engine on iOS.

 

[Abazigal]

It's not about "multiple separate wallets", it's about having the choice of provider. Choose one and stick with it. I assure you Apple Pay will be fine.

Once again, people are not seeing the bigger picture.

Apple Pay is supported by so many banks precisely because it's the default choice on iOS, and banks know that it's either get on board on risk fewer people using their credit card services in favour of a competing alternative which does support Apple Pay.

If there is choice, there is a higher chance that banks may simply elect to not support Apple Pay in favour of pushing their own mobile payment alternative. The end result may indeed be more choice, yes, but fewer meaningful choices because the person electing to use Apple Pay will find that fewer banks support it and it can only be used in fewer places.

This is the whole point of Apple not giving users a choice in certain areas. By putting their weight behind a single option, Apple is able to use its influence to negotiate for better benefits for the end users. Would developers have agreed to incorporate ATT into their apps (better privacy for us) were the iOS App Store not the only option in town and there were alternative app stores available?

So I don't really care about more or less choice; I care about what that means for me, the end user. As it stands, I am already able to use my choice of credit card for Apple Pay, and I am in favour of Apple Pay continuing to be the sole option on iOS so that

1) All banks are forced to get behind said technology
2) More businesses are forced to support it so I can make payments with it

More options will only dilute the bargaining power that Apple has, to my detriment ultimately.

 

[satchmo]

If an iPhone doesn’t provide a user with the features (NFC payments) they need, they can walk and buy an Android phone.

If enough left, it would be up to Apple to decide whether or not to change their position.

Let the market decide, not lawyers and the courtroom.

 

[ackmondual]

I frankly don’t care. I buy a product becuase of what it does. If it doesn’t do what I want it to do I buy something else. I certainly don’t sue a company to try to ensure I get what I want like a self entitled AH. It’s not like other options don’t exist. Don’t try to shoehorn an argument into a situation so it fits a narrative. The simple fact is that if an iPhone and by extension Apple, doesn’t offer what you want, then buy somewhere else.

This is the US. We're "sue happy"

 

[ProfessionalFan]

Gotta say I’m pretty surprised to see so much defense of banks. This is basically banks vs Apple after all.

 

[mikethemartian]

I'm surprised it took this long for another attorney to give it a shot at making big bucks in one go.

Wonder when Ford users will sue GM that they cannot use GM parts or vice versa!!!!!!

You can buy any part you want from GM and repurpose it to your desire.

 

[kpluck]

But should they be able to charge out the wazoo for it when others don't charge?

Yes, absolutely. People are free to use it or not use it.

-kp

 

[MallardDuck]

The ebook settlement killed the viability of the Apple ebook store and left us with amazon as a monopoly. Didn't work out well for consumers.

Apple users know that it's a walled garden. We understand and accept that. If we didn't like it, we could use android, but we don't.

None of the other payment systems offer anything like the privacy protections of Apple Pay...why on earth would someone choose to use them?

 

[Robert.Walter]

@Joe Rossignol

Credit: 0.15% = 0.0015$.

Debit: 1/2x1¢ = 1/2x0.01$ = 0.005$.

Are your original figures correct? It doesn’t make sense that the fee on debit is 3.33x higher.

 

[teh_hunterer]

By the way, vendors can and are encouraged to offer exclusive things, but they must at least offer the option to use something else. The issue here is that some people don't want Apple Pay.

If the issue here was that some people didn't want Apple Pay, those people could vote with their wallet and use something else. The issue is government/law firm forcing Apple to open up their platform.

 

[AppleFan1998]

What’s with all these people trying to get other companies to ride on Apple’s coat tails. It so weird, if you don’t like The “restrictiveness” then just use a different device people, just don’t get it……

 

[Unregistered 4U]

Gotta say I’m pretty surprised to see so much defense of banks. This is basically banks vs Apple after all.

With many people, it could be murderers vs Apple, they’d tie themselves in knots justifying the murderer’s point of view.

 

[GermanSuplex]

They're not calling for Apple Pay to be available on other devices. So Apple Pay can still be an exclusive iOS feature. This isn't like iMessage or FaceTime where you really can only interact with other iOS users (at least while utilizing all of the functionality). Tap-to-pay is very straightforward, it's basically just your phone or watch emulating a tap-to-pay credit card from the perspective of the terminal. So I'm not sure what Apple can offer to make Apple Pay a better "exclusive" feature other than maybe some kind of built in purchase insurance (which basically all CC's already offer - and they're not charging enough for debit card transactions to make it viable for that side). If Google Pay truly is zero-fee, it definitely doesn't look too good for Apple to charge fees on top of the credit card processor fees.

There’s choice. I guess I just don’t get it. I can buy a Google phone or other Android device if I don’t want to use Apple Pay exclusively.

They’re demanding Apple open up the hardware on their devices, which I suppose in some instances I can understand, but many times I can’t. This is one of them. There are not only alternatives in terms of other devices, but there are also alternatives directly on iOS devices themselves.

It’s not that I don’t understand why people want a more open iOS/Apple device, it’s the strong arming them to do so that I’m not understanding.

 

[rweed]

Walmart Pay works just fine on iPhone. Isn't 'tap to pay' per se as you need to activate the camera to make it work, but so what? There is a shortcut that bring it right up.

 

[Johns12]

The ebook settlement killed the viability of the Apple ebook store and left us with amazon as a monopoly. Didn't work out well for consumers.

Apple users know that it's a walled garden. We understand and accept that. If we didn't like it, we could use android, but we don't.

None of the other payment systems offer anything like the privacy protections of Apple Pay...why on earth would someone choose to use them?

I think a closer look back on the facts of the ebook case is in order. Both parties including Amazon were out for their best interest and not the writers. Both were scheming and trying to set themselves up as the de facto arbiter of ebook pricing. Apple did it by colluding with publishers. Amazon did it by flexing their market muscle.

 

[frownface]

TO THE RAMPARTS!!!

It's a mild annoyance to me, since I don't take a lot of public transport these days.

But my friends who do complain about not being being able to tap on/off using their iPhones. They instead have to carry the physical card like it's 2004

 

[The_Gream]

I think people are really not understanding how these fees/cost work.

Debt cards as it says is half a cent per transaction. Debt cards don’t cost the stores as much as credits per transaction and the bank is paying this fee bent fee to Apple. That half cent is a drop of water in the ocean to that bank it doesn’t mean much. People forget apples FaceID was and is probably still years head of anything android. This reduced fraudulent charges if people used Apple Pay.

Credit card companies charge the retail establishment 2-5+% depending on the card issuer (Visa Mastercard etc) plus a flat fee. Apple only takes a .15% from that 2-5+% not the whole transaction. Why? Because of the added layer of security provided. Apple didn’t just invest in making a wallet, they invested in FaceID and TouchID (yes android has these features but at the start of the wallet features theirs were not as interwoven.)

Apple has a right to do business as they see fit within the guidelines of the law. Any judge who gets this should toss it out. If it is really a problem then one of the alphabet soup government agencies that over see NFC integration should be the ones taking Apple to court. It should not be allowed as a class action suit.

Australia banks tried to take Apple to court for this: they lost.

 

[thejadedmonkey]

Why should they though? You want an iPhone, you buy an iPhone. You want Apple Pay, you use an iPhone. It’s a pretty simple metric which is getting blown out of proportion. I can’t use my Tesco club card savings in Asda - why would I be able too? It’s just a benefit of platform loyalty. It’s not designed as a free for all application. Nor should it be forced into one.

I never said they should, just that they could. I'm in agreement that Apple Pay is a good differentiator, and they shouldn't bring it to Android.

 

[bookofxero]

But should they be able to charge out the wazoo for it when others don't charge?

"Out the wazoo"? I do not think you know what that phrase means in this case.