EU Hearing 'Many Concerns' About Potential Anticompetitive Issues With Apple Pay

[Tech198]

I don't believe the EU or any critic that keeps coming back 180 degrees to the start even know what Apple is..

Their a closed system. Apple can do what it wants, support what it wants, lock down what it wants etc.

The companies who refuse to understand, are the same one who who mentioning "stifling" as not competitive, when Apple bring out something that's "better" others just cannot complete for..

We do have EFPOS machines, so settle for second best. Just tap and go. It's just as quick.

Just lacks security, but you can't have it all. If EU raises this fuss, bring out your own limited way of payments.

 

[DeepIn2U]

Nope, if you do business in the EU you have to abide by the rules/laws.

Why is it that each and every time the EU investigates and/or fines companies we get comments like this...a money grab, a few billion means nothing to the EU.
The EU works differently than the USA, accept it.

Um maybe because the EU does this several times a year with Billions ... seems to be funding the EU just fine.

The method, that APPLE took to bring the digital wallet into reality and worked with partners to do so was NOT anti-competitive. The competition rested on their laurels and waiting for Apple to guide the way. Once done we now have 3 standards, 1 which from Google was re-done and re-branded after Samsung Pay launched.

Fact of the matter is ... vendors want their OWN payment system on a device they do NOT build, have no built the OS for, nor would care to follow Apple rules that benefit the security of their end users by implementing custom API's that hide tactics.

Apple created the digitial wallet market place and thus the industry is following suit ... they've done it the legit legal way. Why can't these vendors implement their Apps to use ApplePay and provide a simplistic service to their end users?

 

[Tech198]

Westpac is not doing this either.. I wish they were. They keep saying it will be out, but that was over a year ago, and it's sill on the backburner.

If Apple pay was your main priority, they would be losing customers right about now.

(..and yet, they support the Apple watch.)

 

[Expos of 1969]

double **** the EU, good reason why the UK is trying to get rid of EU control.

Good luck with that. With a fine statesman like Johnson in charge you will undoubtedly be living the good life....

 

[urtules]

Governent should not regulate companies unless there’s a public health concerns.

 

[ForkHandles]

F

 

[cyb3rdud3]

That there sums up the debate. I ask for a description of a possible trade future, you go quiet. You should go quiet as you don’t have the answers, you don’t have the answers as these things are incredibly complicated and can only be solved by experts in trade and national economics.

those who campaign still for Brexit do so in the dark, largely they’ve been trained to hate by our media, they find it hard to explain why they hate, but they do.

No, you didn't. You ignored the valid points made and resorted to name-calling.
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Governent should not regulate companies unless there’s a public health concerns.

What about upholding the laws? What about international tax treaties? Just to name a few.

Don't get me wrong, I'm all for small government but I do recognise there is a role to play for the government as representatives of us.

 

[Essaux]

A government protecting the consumers' rights and being tough on big corporations trying to play monopoly with our money and rights.

Going by some of the comments. A novel and uncomfortable idea I presume to many people on the other side of the Atlantic?

 

[MacBH928]

how does Apple make money off Apple Pay? If they take a cut, and Apple card takes another cut, and MasterCard/Visa takes a cut...thats too much cutting for the retailer.

Easy solution - Apple just opens up the NFC chip to Samsung Pay, Walmart connect or whatever service there is out there.

While I would like that... its not exactly right, unless there is a law that forces companies to install other equipment and 3rd party accessories on their products.

For example, Playstation should let Xbox games play on their devices or its anti-competitive. Microsoft should export and import in every possible file format out there, or its anti-competitive. Retailers should shelve every product out there, or its anti-competitive.

 

[LV426]

The EU are like those blasted meddling kids from Scooby Doo.

I dread to think how much tax payers money they burn through with this stuff. Roll on Brexit.

Brexit are the Scooby Doo villains here. The Brexit party wants total misalignment and deregulation from the EU, a race to the bottom on standards. Singapore-On-Thames. It will be total devastation for the UK economy, killing off large parts of manufacturing and allowing spiv companies to thrive. Money will be king, and it will be a godsend for hedge fund managers. Jacob Rees-Mogg has moved his money offshore because he knows the economy will be trashed, leading to rich pickings for him and his ilk.

 

[cyb3rdud3]

how does Apple make money off Apple Pay? If they take a cut, and Apple card takes another cut, and MasterCard/Visa takes a cut...thats too much cutting for the retailer.



While I would like that... its not exactly right, unless there is a law that forces companies to install other equipment and 3rd party accessories on their products.

For example, Playstation should let Xbox games play on their devices or its anti-competitive. Microsoft should export and import in every possible file format out there, or its anti-competitive. Retailers should shelve every product out there, or its anti-competitive.

The retailer, as most do, can also accept direct card payments, or Paypal, etc.

it is entirely their choice whether it is worth their while to make that sale by offering convenience of multiple payment methods to their customers.

 

[Bug-Creator]

Playstation should let Xbox games play on their devices or its anti-competitive

Thats not even remotely what this is about....

If Sony blocks MicroSoft (or anybody else) from (re)releasing XBox games on the Playstation than you would have a similar case.

 

[cyb3rdud3]

Brexit are the Scooby Doo villains here. The Brexit party wants total misalignment and deregulation from the EU, a race to the bottom on standards. Singapore-On-Thames. It will be total devastation for the UK economy, killing off large parts of manufacturing and allowing spiv companies to thrive. Money will be king, and it will be a godsend for hedge fund managers. Jacob Rees-Mogg has moved his money offshore because he knows the economy will be trashed, leading to rich pickings for him and his ilk.

No race to the bottom on standards at all. Standards will still apply when selling into any market. It just opens up possibility to other markets as well.

take a look at something as simple as alloy wheels. Many are manufactured in China, or Italy, as two big producers. They have all sorts of stamps on them to identify their compliance with multiple standards like JWL or TuV etc.
Same with light units or bulbs etc.

leaving the EU doesn’t have to mean a race to the bottom at all.
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Thats not even remotely what this is about....

If Sony blocks MicroSoft (or anybody else) from (re)releasing XBox games on the Playstation than you would have a similar case.

And Apple doesn’t block that do they? I mean I can make payments with PayPal on my iOS device. I can also make payments direct using my cards. Or I can use the banking app. Or I can use the Apple wallet to store my banking cards and use that. Lots of choices and not just limited to Apple Pay.

 

[Bug-Creator]

Um maybe because the EU does this several times a year with Billions ... seems to be funding the EU just fine.

By this "logic" the emissions scandal only happened cos someone wanted VW to fund California.....


Reality is those fines (if it ever comes to that) a just a drop in the bucket that is the EU budget.
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And Apple doesn’t block that do they?

*shrug* finding that out is what the hearings are about.....

 

[Khedron]

I disagree. I see it as. case of Apple are the ones who started from scratch in the garage of Steve Jobs' parents. Apple are the ones who worked hard over the years to get where they are now and they did so by offering products and services that people loved and bought. Now they have made that work and determination a success rivals want Apple to basically give them a free helping hand simply because they were and are not quite as successful as Apple have been.
That is like you working hard to get a promotion and pay rise at work and then I come along in my junior position and demand that you then go out of your way to get me a promotion as well whilst using your wages to do so.
This despite the fact that I did not earn it or work for it, surely you would say to me "I am not helping you when you want a free ride and have not put any hard graft in, if you want a promotion then do what I did and work for it".

That is no different to Apple and the EU seeing Euro signs in their eyes so they can try to thus give competitors a free helping hand.

I do not subscribe at all to the idea that no company can compete with Apple Pay/other Apple services on their own merits. They might need to be not have an app on the iPhone but instead might need to be creative however they can do it.
They just need to shut up moaning and actually try competing instead.

Very weak attempt to portray Apple as the underdog.

This is Apple saying "thanks for other people for developing NFC hardware and protocols but we feel big enough to be able to lock out any software that competes with ours without suffering any consequences [the definition of a monopoly]".

What next? The Spotify app isn't allowed to use the WiFi connection but that's not anti-competitive either? It's perfectly reasonable that Spotify should just start making WiFi dongles for iPhones? Except Apple also controls the lightning port so it has to be bluetooth. And then Apple locks out the bluetooth chip like they already do with HomePod.

 

[gnasher729]

Why is that a bad idea? There's no public-interest reason why buying a phone should lock you into the phone vendor's payment system.

I have a Visa debit card registered with Apple Pay. My payment system is Visa debit, not Apple Pay. "Apple Pay" is just the name for a feature on the iPhone that allows me to use the Visa debit payment system without pulling the Visa debit card out of my pocket.
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Well, the contactless technology that Apple Pay and many others rely on are standard technologies. As long as the card terminal accepts contactless payment, no further work is required by the vendor to make Apple Pay work.

An iPhone with Apple Pay can _pretend_ to be a contactless debit or credit card, and the terminal will accept payment just as usual, with the usual limits (in the UK: £30 per payment, £100 per day). To allow higher limits, the terminal has to specifically recognise that there is an iPhone with Apple Pay (controlled by a finger print sensor or FaceId, so more secure than a contactless card which someone might have pulled out of your pocket). For higher limits with Google Pay they would have to do something similar.
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Good luck with that. With a fine statesman like Johnson in charge you will undoubtedly be living the good life....

Mr. Bonobo Johnson said "We will leave the EU by October 31st, do or die". Since we didn't leave, the country is waiting for the second part. He also said "I'd rather lie dead in a ditch than ask for an extension", then asked for an extension which was granted. The man lives dangerously.

 

[rocknblogger]

Well, after 2 pages of posts, NO ONE has commented on your post, which goes to show you that no one, these days, reads others posts - they just react. Obviously, Apple has already started to allow exactly what the EU is complaining about (third-party NFC chip access), but other competitors haven't decided to participate at this time. Perhaps it's because Apple's payment offering is superior, at least for now, so they don't see the point of offering their service on the Apple platform.

I’m sorry for quoting your post specifically but this has nothing to do with NFC or anything remotely connected to it.

What this is about is...is Apple pressuring merchants to use Apple Pay instead of other payment services like Stripe, PayPal or a number of other options.

For example let’s say I sell widgets and I create an app for selling my widgets on iOS and I use Stripe on my website but Apple says I now have to accept Apple Pay instead of Stripe. If that is the case that is in fact anticompetitive. Maybe Apple says I have to add Apple Pay as an option if I want to be on Apple devices. This too might be a problem. Why should I have to use Apple Pay if I’m already set up with Stripe and have been for years?

If you folks would just read the article you would all see that this has nothing to do with what everyone here is commenting on. FFS people are jumping in to defend Apple without even understanding what it’s about.

 

[LV426]

No race to the bottom on standards at all. Standards will still apply when selling into any market. It just opens up possibility to other markets as well.

take a look at something as simple as alloy wheels. Many are manufactured in China, or Italy, as two big producers. They have all sorts of stamps on them to identify their compliance with multiple standards like JWL or TuV etc.
Same with light units or bulbs etc.

leaving the EU doesn’t have to mean a race to the bottom at all.

Well, there you go. You've just highlighted a simple example of where standards certainly can degrade. If China want to sell alloy wheels in the UK, they currently have to conform to the EU's CE standards. Post-Brexit, there is no guarantee that the UK will maintain those standards for imports. Many radical Torys cite maintaining standards equivalence as anathema.

It's a complete myth that the UK don't have good access to markets other than the EU. As it happens, we have a fantastic range of trading arrangements with other countries precisely because we are EU members, the world's largest trading bloc. We have tremendous clout in belonging to this club.

 

[dernhelm]

This question is tangential to the OP (as are many of these posts) but I'm curious about something. Do current Android devices support Apple Pay? Just curious. If 80% of the EU is on Android, why wouldn't Apple put some small effort into getting Apple Pay to work on those devices? It isn't like they don't have the engineers to do it, and it certainly isn't like they're allergic to money.

 

[cube]

This question is tangential to the OP (as are many of these posts) but I'm curious about something. Do current Android devices support Apple Pay? Just curious. If 80% of the EU is on Android, why wouldn't Apple put some small effort into getting Apple Pay to work on those devices? It isn't like they don't have the engineers to do it, and it certainly isn't like they're allergic to money.

It is like Apple not being really interested in making software for Windows.

 

[justperry]

Um maybe because the EU does this several times a year with Billions ... seems to be funding the EU just fine.

The method, that APPLE took to bring the digital wallet into reality and worked with partners to do so was NOT anti-competitive. The competition rested on their laurels and waiting for Apple to guide the way. Once done we now have 3 standards, 1 which from Google was re-done and re-branded after Samsung Pay launched.

Fact of the matter is ... vendors want their OWN payment system on a device they do NOT build, have no built the OS for, nor would care to follow Apple rules that benefit the security of their end users by implementing custom API's that hide tactics.

Apple created the digitial wallet market place and thus the industry is following suit ... they've done it the legit legal way. Why can't these vendors implement their Apps to use ApplePay and provide a simplistic service to their end users?

NFC is locked to Apple, no-one except Apple can make Apps for it, so it is anti competitive.

 

[LordVic]

This question is tangential to the OP (as are many of these posts) but I'm curious about something. Do current Android devices support Apple Pay? Just curious. If 80% of the EU is on Android, why wouldn't Apple put some small effort into getting Apple Pay to work on those devices? It isn't like they don't have the engineers to do it, and it certainly isn't like they're allergic to money.

Apple absolutely could do it. There's nothing technical in Android devices that would block Apple from rolling out Apple Pay, or some derivitive of it to Android. In Android's case, this is because the NFC chip is not locked down to developers.

any one of us could write any number of programs/uses for the NFC chip in Android phones. Apple (last I checked) does NOT allow 3rd party apps from using the hardware. This is the nature of this thread. Apple locks everyone else out, so if you want to use a NFC based payment system, you must only use Apple pay, or nothing else (on an iPhone). This is generally seen as anti-competitive.

IMHO, the only question that really matters is whether or not Apple's in a monopolistic position to warrant antitrust or not.

 

[rocknblogger]

Am I missing something or is everyone in this thread talking about something not related to the article?
isnt it all based around actually paying for items in apps and websites and not the physical NFC payments made in physical shops?

Good lord!!! Thank you. You’re the ONLY other person I have seen get this right.

 

[winston1236]

The best response Apple can give to the EU socialists is to let free market capitalism provide the answer - let the people decide which platform is the best of all.

Yes that's worked great, maybe Apple can use the U.S. healthcare system as an example in their argument.

 

[cyb3rdud3]

Well, there you go. You've just highlighted a simple example of where standards certainly can degrade. If China want to sell alloy wheels in the UK, they currently have to conform to the EU's CE standards. Post-Brexit, there is no guarantee that the UK will maintain those standards for imports. Many radical Torys cite maintaining standards equivalence as anathema.

It's a complete myth that the UK don't have good access to markets other than the EU. As it happens, we have a fantastic range of trading arrangements with other countries precisely because we are EU members, the world's largest trading bloc. We have tremendous clout in belonging to this club.

I’m sure you’ll be aware that many BSI standards predate the EU. Why would the U.K. give up on those? Any facts to back that up?
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Good lord!!! Thank you. You’re the ONLY other person I have seen get this right.

And I’ve highlighted several times that you can pay on websites anyway you like.
Likewise there are many apps that provide restricted access unless you have a subscription elsewhere. Office 365 is a good example and so is Google GSuite. Although Office 365 later brought in an alternative method as well where you now in addition to the alternative systems can pay using Apple Pay.