Retailers Cite 'Insufficient Customer Demand' as Biggest Reason for Not Supporting Apple Pay

[mrxak]

So you, one single person in the whole world, have not had any credit card theft related issues.

That clearly means there is no risk!

I personally have not been killed in a car crash so that must mean that car crashes don't actually happen -so I might as well stop using my seat belt. I also have not been killed in a motorcycle accident so I don't need to wear a helmet. Additionally I haven't ever been taken hostage by terrorists so I might as well vacation in Mosul.

Perhaps you missed the part where I said I had two issues with credit card theft? But these "issues" were taken care of automatically by the credit card issuer. They are the ones who end up losing money if your info gets stolen, so they are the ones who monitor against fraud and do everything in their power to prevent it, thus saving me, the guy with the credit card, any real hassle. The risk is entirely on the credit card issuer.

 

[s2mikey]

I think that sums it up nicely. I got in on this story a little late so I read only the first and last pages of posts. True to their reputation the ultra-purists started out by vowing not to shop with stores that don't play 100% with Apple. Those ultra-fans are always here at the beginning of a thread.

Finally the grownups show up with reality. I for one bought my iPhone 6 on the first day with Touch ID and Apple Pay in mind. I love my iPhone but still have yet to use Apple Pay even once. I just don't care that much about it. Keeping my phone in my pocket and pulling a credit card out of my wallet seems natural. All my charges show up in the same place and in the same manner.

I guess Apple Pay is a pretty cool idea. It just seems to me that it is another one of Apple's way too many new toys/gimmicks/services. I just don't live to do everything the Apple Way. I like My Way.

Yep. You got it. I'm not even sure it's a cool idea. As I said before, it seems to be a solution to a problem that didn't really exist. Cards work fine, are quick, easy, and security is no worse than with any other form of digital payment. Those are the facts. The crackhead phone users who can't for the life of them do ANYTHING without their phone being involved can keep sulking and refusing to shop at certain stores all they want. They can "make their statement" <<< LOL while the rest of us live our lives and have fun shopping.

 

[garya73]

It's probably already been said, but it's the generation who is coming up now and are teenagers who will be exposed to cashless and cardless payment systems that will fully embrace these technologies, not the people in their 20's and older that will finally sway the retailers to offer contactless payments. That, and the iminent death of CurrentC.

These retailers must be in the dark if they claim there is no demand. All they have to do is look at the numbers from Whole Foods. Plus all the Coca-Cola vending machines that now accept contactless payments. They already have to update their terminals to be compliant with the new laws and chip and pin, so why not just go the extra mile and turn on nfc payments? If you build it, they will come. They can still mine data by requiring the use of store loyalty cards to get shopper information.

I dream of the day where cash intensive places like big concerts/festivals, carnivals, fairs, all go cashless and we don't have to carry around a bundle of cash or use sketchy ATMs to get money. I think they will find that people will be more eager to spend more money.

 

[arkmannj]

Insufficient demand? I suspect Apple Pay will grow larger when people (such as myself) upgrade from the iPhone 4s/5/5s. My Wife and I will likely use Apple Pay once we own devices that support it.

 

[Nashville]

Retailers are reactive with Technology, not proactive and visionary. Apple users are a huge block of customers with higher incomes. If I were a retailer I would be all over adding and promoting we have Apple Pay.

Despite Apple dubbing 2015 "the year of Apple Pay" in its January earnings call, a number of big-name retailers remain skeptical over the contactless payments service, according to Reuters. The service launched last October in the U.S. and has steadily gained support from numerous banks and retailers in the months since.

Working through the National Retail Federation's top 100 United States merchants, of which Apple said "about half" would begin to accept Apple Pay this year, Reuters found the company's predictions may be "too optimistic," with many retailers remaining skeptical about Apple Pay. After questioning and interviewing a total of 98 of the top 100 NRF merchants, it was discovered that fewer than a quarter of the retailers currently accept Apple Pay while nearly two-thirds of the companies confirmed they would not be supporting the mobile payments service this year. Just four retailers confirmed to Reuters that they would in fact be joining the support of Apple Pay in 2015.

Apple has still made significant progress since the service's debut last October, increasing retail acceptance to over 700,000 points of sale as of the last financial Apple Pay update in March. According to one retailer not accepting Apple Pay, the Cupertino-based company comes on strong when pitching to possible partners.
When searching for a reason why so many companies were against backing the service, "insufficient customer demand" was the biggest reason cited by merchants. This was followed by lack of data access granted through observing customer buying habits, cost of installation, and support of other contactless payments solutions like Current-C. Twenty-eight total retailers noted that lack of data access, and the inability to send customized advertisements to individual users like traditional credit cards allow, is a "key reason" they won't accept Apple Pay.

Despite questions about the future of Apple Pay, its current partners echo enthusiasm in customer satisfaction and ease-of-use with Apple Pay. Whole Foods spokesperson Michael Silverman told Reuters that Apple's mobile wallet accounted for 2 percent of its sales dollars as of March, with an expected increase in the future. "Our shoppers are really enjoying the speed, convenience and security of Apple Pay," Silverman said. With WWDC around the corner, and rumors of much-requested features such as a rewards program coming to the platform, its likely additional companies will come around to Apple Pay as Apple beefs up the still fairly nascent service and consumer traction continues to improve.

Update 11:19 AM: Apple has provided a statement to iMore standing by its predictions of Apple Pay adoption for this year with some additional context not shared in the Reuters report.

Article Link: Retailers Cite 'Insufficient Customer Demand' as Biggest Reason for Not Supporting Apple Pay

 

[TheHateMachine]

MCX Group strikes again.

 

[rulymammoth]

They'll get there. It won't be 2016 when we think of smartphones as a common a way to pay as cash or card, but we'll get there eventually.

If there was an incentive for merchants to encourage people to use it - for example, "If you use Apple Pay you can get 10% off your next purchase" - Awareness & usage would increase, I'm sure. Some shops here in the UK offer you money off if you sign up to their mailing list.

+1. This is still in its infancy. Big corporations are dinosaurs. Only a few will be early adopters. Most of the rest will follow along once a trend is clear.

 

[j800r]

Well, infancy also depends on where you are. Eg the USA seems to adopt new technology much faster and as such are usually ahead. (based on casual observation)

 

[AdonisSMU]

That is an excellent point .

Though being a U.S. Company , I cannot see them dropping a feature outside of the U.S. First. And also given the population difference, they will make more money in the is anyway.

Fingers crossed whatever they announce today is going to be avialable to all of us .

Also maybe there is a benefit to doing US first because of less users.

 

[tmiw]

It's probably already been said, but it's the generation who is coming up now and are teenagers who will be exposed to cashless and cardless payment systems that will fully embrace these technologies, not the people in their 20's and older that will finally sway the retailers to offer contactless payments.

That's still a fairly small number of people compared to the rest of the population, though. By that logic it could take decades before NFC's used on a widespread basis (and what bank or retailer is going to turn on/keep a feature that won't ever do anything in a reasonable timeframe other than cost money?) It's more likely that it'll follow age trends for other payment methods--55+ will likely not adopt it in significant numbers while under 55 will.

 

[dontwalkhand]

That is an excellent point .

Though being a U.S. Company , I cannot see them dropping a feature outside of the U.S. First. And also given the population difference, they will make more money in the is anyway.

Fingers crossed whatever they announce today is going to be avialable to all of us .

Not only that but with the way European banks operate, they're making it harder to deploy something like Apple Pay. Their credit card fees are capped which makes it harder for Apple to get their 0.0005% or whatever it was. It will eat into their banks profit in a jiffy compared to the U.S.

On top of that, much of Europe despite having so called higher tech credit card technology, is still very much cash oreinted compared to the U.S.' Plastic oriented society.

We are getting the chip card readers in October (hell all of my cards are chip now), and three major retail store accept a Chip & PIN transaction and runs all chip cards as such. With these new terminals they generally include NFC as well, which is why lately I've been able to use Apple Pay at a large number of mom and pop stores, whereas 3 months ago, it was unheard of.

Give it time folks, the chip card deadline isn't even here yet.

 

[AlecZ]

That's the same mentality that lead to most Americans being fat.


Oh, the horror.


I hope you realize how little sense this sentence makes.

It's the "chicken and egg" problem. It does make sense. No, I'm not a fat American, but I don't want to deal with extra stuff if I don't have to. I've got more important things to worry about than trying to replace an already decent payment method for whenever I go to Walgreens or a select few other stores. That's probably the same reason why other people don't bother with Apple Pay.

 

[dontwalkhand]

It's the "chicken and egg" problem. It does make sense. No, I'm not a fat American, but I don't want to deal with extra stuff if I don't have to. I've got more important things to worry about than trying to replace an already decent payment method for whenever I go to Walgreens or a select few other stores. That's probably the same reason why other people don't bother with Apple Pay.

Other people don't bother because they don't know. Everyone of my clients I see with an iPhone 6, I tell them about Apple Pay and 80% of the time they didn't even know it was there. Their answer generally included "I didn't know it could do that. The guy at Verizon set up the phone for me"

Remember not everybody is a tech head and most people don't even watch the news anymore. They literally knew nothing about it!

The same people with improper or no iCloud accounts. The same people who don't even know about Siri.

Sure The banks did some marketing but it certainly wasn't enough. A splash screen on an ATM is great, but most people out there are now oblivious to ads. ads on TV don't even work anymore.

 

[\-V-/]

It's the "chicken and egg" problem. It does make sense. No, I'm not a fat American, but I don't want to deal with extra stuff if I don't have to. I've got more important things to worry about than trying to replace an already decent payment method for whenever I go to Walgreens or a select few other stores. That's probably the same reason why other people don't bother with Apple Pay.

All you're doing is making baseless assumptions.

 

[j800r]

Well, I retract me previous statement. I just saw on the event that they're bringing Apple pay to the UK. Seems a few major retailers are gonna be getting on board.

 

[class77]

I'd love to know who they are asking to demonstrate lack of demand.....

 

[JesperA]

Wow, Jimmy Iovine was a little bit awkward :S

 

[0970373]

Wow, Jimmy Iovine was a little bit awkward :S

Not as awkward as Drake. lol

 

[cub850G2]

If there really was "Insufficient Customer Demand" then why all these new Apple Pay merchants? http://images.apple.com/live/2015-j...22d0ebe0a4f27b2047555729f_expanded_xlarge.jpg Their excuses are Bull, its all about Data, but that shouldn't be an issue for like Kroger where you can get them to scan the loyalty card then pay with your phone, geeze. Or they could even send the loyalty card via NFC making it even more seamless!

 

[tmiw]

If there really was "Insufficient Customer Demand" then why all these new Apple Pay merchants? http://images.apple.com/live/2015-j...22d0ebe0a4f27b2047555729f_expanded_xlarge.jpg Their excuses are Bull, its all about Data, but that shouldn't be an issue for like Kroger where you can get them to scan the loyalty card then pay with your phone, geeze. Or they could even send the loyalty card via NFC making it even more seamless!

It's easier than that--anything that makes paying for things using Visa and MasterCard even easier means retailers have less leverage to get those fees reduced or even go back to being cash/debit only. Not being able to track people without their consent just adds insult to injury.

 

[valkraider]

and debit cards don't work with Apple Pay, so even though the liquor store takes it, I use a debit card.

...

Also banks should allow the use of debit cards.

I am not sure what bank you use, but I have been using my debit card from my bank with Pay for months now...

 

[AustinIllini]

I'd love to know who they are asking to demonstrate lack of demand.....

I don't buy it. Apple Pay is huge at its current implementations. I still get so mad the HEB NFC doesn't work.

 

[valkraider]

That's the simple truth. Nobody will be able to organize enough activists to make noise about Apple Pay that would even come close to the disorganized revolt of independent people over moving the ketchup.

This is the best paragraph in this whole thread.

 

[oddnendz]

So, how many of those retailers (questioning the demand of ApplePay) are MCX members?

 

[cub850G2]

I don't buy it. Apple Pay is huge at its current implementations. I still get so mad the HEB NFC doesn't work.

Casey's General Store around here is the same way, they have the older blue L5300's(The Triple Black model is the same model mostly) but the NFC doesn't light up and it says "Please Swipe Your Payment Card" on the screen so its off for sure. They said they hope to enable it soon and I'm betting HEB is in a similar situation as Casey's.
"H-E-B ‏@HEB Mar 9
@TexanSarcastic We are looking into Apple Pay to enhance our customer shopping experience. At H-E-B, your suggestions are appreciated."

I want to say that this article is probably somewhat crap, Best Buy is going to accept contactless right after they install the brand new pos system at all stores is what I've from an employee, not in 2016, Kohl's has said Fall 2015 and I'm betting Dunkin Donuts is Fall 2015 too, none of them in 2016. I think waiting until 2016 is crap especially when MCX said that their members could support Apple Pay if they wanted to. I bet Target will wait until 2016 although they are very pro CurrentC. "Coming Soon" doesn't mean 6 months anyways.