Otherwise it'll remain a tiny proportion of the overall payments industry.
https://www.financialexpress.com/industry/beggars-with-qr-co...
But with SEPA Instant Payments (https://www.ecb.europa.eu/paym/integration/retail/instant_pa...) there is:
- A scheme that works based on standards: ISO PACS messages (easy for other banks to join)
- Actually transfer the funds from bank A to bank B (not sure if other schemes mentioned here basically work on a "we received an acknowledgement, we promise to send the actual money later via a real payment") in a 10 second period
- Does not depend on the commitment of a (small) group of private companies top keep existing, but instead depends on an obligation in EU law enforcing the national banks to force their member banks to implement it
The only thing that still sucks is that you send money to others based on their IBAN - which is fine but definitely not as intuitive as an e-mail address or phone number.
I was shocked as a young adult when I could travel in the US and use my debit card to get money at almost any atm, yet Americans had to sometimes seek out the correct ATM, even in their country.
I was shocked again in Japan when I moved here ten years ago when online banking was useless, transfers took up to 3 days, and most of the bank’s atms closed at 5 or 6pm. Oddly enough I could always find some atm open 24 hours that worked with my Canadian debit card, even when I could not find an atm open that worked with my Japan Post bank debit card. Those problems are all solved now, but it’s no wonder that there are now 30+ competing digital payment systems in Japan vs just a few in Canada. You also have to still really go out of your way when choosing a bank to make sure that your debit card will work overseas.
The original Canadian system is called Interac, and it’s nice that everyone has been able to use it for 30+ Years. I’ve never heard of anyone being blacklisted due to an error, like you hear about with PayPal and the other things that have come since then.
When it works perfectly, the transaction is still nowhere near instant (transfers “cross” only at certain times of the day, almost as if it involves actual people driving between banks - ludicrous!) and recipient banks often do not recognize receipt for a day. And the fees are relatively absurd ($80-120 to send and to the same to receive) considering Interac money transfers are free.
I’ll note that literally everyone I deal with shares the same experiences with wires.
It is bizarre that the largest, likely most important, transactions we have a system that works objectively far worse with fewer checks and balances and more opportunity for error than the system we use for meaningless small transactions.
ATMs are also mind-boggling after getting used to banks that will refund ATM fees in the US. In Canada it's back to the fee to use ATM + fee from the bank for using an ATM that I remember from 20 years ago in the US.
Little cumbersome since I never bothered to get peoples phone numbers till recently.
It seems that, by now, except Czech Republic & Slovakia [1], the EPC QR code [2] has won.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Short_Payment_Descriptor [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/EPC_QR_code
Payment links are easier and quicker to use than manually entering details in your banking app.
Nobody in technology, at least in the USA, seems to be able to make the marketing for their "payment things" understandable. On the Google side, there is (or was) Google Wallet (OG), Android Pay, Google Pay, gPay, now Google Wallet (new). I don't know which one I should be using, or what each one deliberately can't do. Some handset makers have their own apps: Samsung Pay, for example. Then, there's the individual apps: Venmo, PayPal, Square Cash, Zelle, Xoom...
A web search shows there are probably a dozen more, all incompatible with each other. It's like VHS vs Betamax and HD-DVD vs. BluRay all over again, but instead with 20 different formats. How has this industry so royally fucked up something that should be pretty straightforward?
I guess it's luck that some countries happened to get the banks to agree to something like this at the particular time when the technology needed to support it just had matured (in Sweden a government supported e-ID had just become prevalent), and then it's kind of difficult for them to pull out and say "now everybody should pay for it".
Here you can pay with Swish in most stores as well, but the prevalent payment method there is still mastercard/visa I think.
Because... money? Venmo built up the biggest user base and was subsequently bought out by PayPal for big bucks. Zelle was a major initiative by the banks themselves, but too late, I suppose, to sway the habits of the consumers themselves. There was also SquareCash, but they were also too late into the game, particularly because they had no institutional support behind them like Zelle. Lastly, Apple Cash, while particularly convenient, IMHO just did not advertise it well enough. Also, being limited to Apple devices only, kinda misses the point of making payments easy, since you can't be expected to always remember/check which device does your payee have.
Most other service you mentioned were just regular payment processing intermediaries, not p2p solutions like Venmo/Squarecash/Apple Cash.
It's a mess indeed, but at the end of the day, from my experience, Venmo in the US still is the go-to method, seconded only by Zelle.
If you ever have to ask this in America, the answer is almost always corporations and lobbying.
> How has this industry so royally fucked up something that should be pretty straightforward?
There has been a constant trend throughout history minimize plebian agency and power. For a few decades after WWII the common citizen gained agency and now corporations and governments alike are clawing it back.
Anything that can be represented in a barcode or QR code can be stored in it. Which of course turns out to be a lot of things, payments are just one part of it.
Edit: added link, but it's preinstalled on most modern Android devices.
Don't forget Fitbit Pay! (As Google apparently did)
- Apple Pay is a method to pay using the payment cards in your Wallet in stores and online that is supported by many credit/debit cards
- Apple Card is a MasterCard credit card
- Apple Cash is an bank account with a VISA debit card. This is inline with other similar services like the popular "Cash app"
Compared to other confusing naming schemes (Apple TV/+, and absolutely anything Google does) this seems pretty straightforward to me.
(Also a neat part of a virtual card: checking in the Apple Wallet I can see that the card already switched numbers/networks for me. I don't need to wait for a replacement card. If not for this comment I wouldn't have even thought to check if it had switched, just transparent in the background. I probably got an email on it I ignored if I had wanted to know sooner, but there are so many emails.)
So Apple Pay is the service, Apple Card is their credit card and Apple Cash is their debit card via some bank. You can sidestep all that and just put your own credit card in the Wallet and use some other cash-like service.
The large problem with a lot of these cash-like services is in order for the exchange to happen, two people have to be on the same service. If Apple Cash takes off, then you just need to know if your friend has an iPhone and then its viable and much easier than having to go signup for one of these other services (zelle, cash app, venmo, etc.) just to chip in for a gift or dinner.
You can. In fact, if you're using Apple Card, the cash-back rewards show up as Apple Cash.
(Some confusion here is that you can have a separate Apple Store/iTunes credit that isn't Apple Cash and doesn't show up as a card in the Apple Wallet and can only be spent in the Apple Store/iTunes. Given the nature of how gift cards work that's likely to remain a separate "cash fund" and the two separate balances may always be a little confusing, with some people likely putting money into one when they meant to put it into the other. Hopefully Apple may find a good way to communicate the differences between them.)
It's also a virtual debit card, so you can spend or transfer the money, but it seems the its raison d'être is p2p payments.
Pay is the whole system of APIs used to pay via NFC or online, authed by biometrics (Touch/FaceID). As a user you just add your credit card and it works better than contactless credit cards.
Apple Card is an Apple credit card with cashback backed by Goldman Sachs. US-only.
"Apple Cash services are provided by Green Dot Bank, Member FDIC. Learn more about the Terms and Conditions. Only available in the U.S. on eligible devices. To send and receive money with an Apple Cash account, you must be 18 and a U.S. resident. If you’re under 18, your family organizer can set up Apple Cash for you as part of their Apple Cash Family account. Security checks may require more time to make funds available. Apple Cash Family accounts can send or receive up to $2000 per transaction or within a seven-day period. Sending money from Wallet requires iOS 15.5 or later.
An Apple Cash card is required to use Daily Cash, except if you do not have an Apple Cash card, in which case you can only apply your Daily Cash as a credit on your statement balance. The Apple Cash card is issued by Green Dot Bank, Member FDIC. See apple.com/apple-pay for more information. Daily Cash is earned on purchases after the transaction posts to your account. Actual posting times vary by merchant. Daily Cash is subject to exclusions, and additional details apply. See the Apple Card Customer Agreement for more information.
Variable APRs range from 11.24% to 22.24% based on creditworthiness. Rates as of April 1, 2022.
To access and use all the features of Apple Card, you must add Apple Card to Wallet on an iPhone or iPad with the latest version of iOS or iPadOS. Update to the latest version by going to Settings > General > Software Update. Tap Download and Install.
Available for qualifying applicants in the United States.
Apple Card is issued by Goldman Sachs Bank USA, Salt Lake City Branch"https://support.apple.com/en-ca/HT207886
it says among other requirements for Apple Cash:
What you need
- Be at least 18 years old and live in the United States.
I only did a cursory glance at it but is there an Android app planned for this? In my experience, people want to send money to one another across different mobile OSes.
I can't imagine how Apple concluded that "It's exactly like Venmo in every way, but it only works for people with iPhones!" would make a particularly compelling value proposition.
The sad part is that these apps are needed at all. In Australia the government just regulated that all banks must support free and instant money transfers and that email addresses and phone numbers be supported as addresses to send to.
So if your friend wants to send you money, you type their email on any bank app and it pops up with their legal name confirming you have the right person. The money shows up instantly.
Privacy is an area where Apple tries to differentiate. It’s not great that this is Apple only, but it’s also nice that it just works.
Like mobile money in Africa, various service providers will jump up to allow cross wallet transfers.
I would use Zelle for cross device transfer or any of the other apps, it's not like we have a shortage of them. Although I agree it would be good if we had less of them to need to use.
Is this sentence what you actually meant to say? It makes sense if the last noun is "Android".
Anyway, I ended up just writing a Matrix bot* that's a glorified spreadsheet. It's 600 lines of Rust, or probably 100 of Python. Works a treat!
* https://github.com/pkulak/bots/blob/main/src/bots/money.rs
Few products have made our personal lives so much easier. Not having to ever get/give cash for them is amazing.
From the FAQ: >How do I add money to my Apple Cash card? >If you’re under 18, money is added to your Apple Cash card only when someone sends you money.
Apple has had Cash for a long time (the Apple Card uses it for card rewards).
I am worried about them now. They will find this super convenient and will use it from day one. Hope this service is private.
If so, then this page may answer your question. Basically unless you’re transferring over $22k in total in a year using Apple Cash, you’re fine.
https://www.irs.gov/businesses/small-businesses-self-employe...
Multiply such occurrences several times a month and you get the idea.
Thanks for the link, it's helpful.
Not a lawyer but I remember reading that the IRS (or equivalent) would be watching for patterns (large amounts/frequent transfers in just below a threshold etc across different sources -- bank accounts etc) . If there is probable cause, they might have to get a subpoena. This app is just one more source for them to confirm/deny wrongdoing.
Can I get the money out of Apple Cash, except for spending it via Apple Pay? Can I withdraw the money to a bank account? If not, I find it a bit limiting. If someone sends me money via Paypal, I can transfer it to my bank account and withdraw it from an ATM, or use it to buy stocks, or donate it to some organization that doesn't take Apple Pay payments...
Never heard of Green Dot Bank. They seem to have these banks listed under them:
"GO2bank, GoBank and Bonneville Bank".
I assume that Green Dot Bank isn't holding the money itself but passing it on to a bigger bank. Anyone know who's actually behind this ?
Edit: I think maybe Green Dot is holding the money themselves on this are they a well known bank in the USA ?
Green Dot is or was the dominant prepaid card sold in Walmart and all major grocery stores. They offer a Rapid Reload service where you can bring cash to a Walmart register and have it loaded into a prepaid card.
They basically serve people who have been ejected from the banking system. One of their main products was an anonymous card that could be reloaded and used to transfer money. A favorite of prostitutes and other illegal services that was eventually snuffed out by the banks because of KYC (know your customer) violations.
People would load money onto the card and just give it to someone else or transfer between them. All anon.
Most banks wouldn't work in this manner due to high risk.
Edit - Looks like they do pre-paid credit cards, which explain why I’ve never heard of them. Been around since 1999.
Consumers also enjoy CFPB protection/regulation with this product.
Apple calls Green Dot APIs for servicing and the backing account(s) is at Green Dot Bank.
To be fair, it would be borderline pointless here. Bank transfers are instant and free in almost all cases, and competition from the challenger banks has made the process a lot smoother in the legacy banks’ apps too.
I think the only USP Apple’s offering would have here is nice iMessage integration.
Smart. Its a clever way to deal with legal boundaries on transferring money. Should be interesting to see them get it past Australian regulations.
[0] https://dfpi.ca.gov/money-transmitter-division/directory-of-...
is this VISA CardPay ?
The cards are issued by Green Dot Bank
Just want to post it since Apple kinda buried it deep down.