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Comment by el_benhameen | Hacker News Reader

When I first got an iPhone with Apple Pay, I felt ridiculous pulling it out to buy groceries. It felt gimmicky, like I was showing off. That changed when my grocery store started requiring chipped cards to use the chip. AP easily shaves 20-30 seconds off the transaction. I can pay while items are still being scanned, I don't have to remember to remove the card, and the auth process is just faster. Works well enough for me that it's now my primary payment method when it's accepted.

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Aren't you able to just tap your chip card on the terminal without a pin for purchases less than ~$100?

I live in Australia and this is literally everywhere.

As always, the US is a little behind the times on this too - most credit cards here don't have contactless yet. (I have one that does but its a rarity)

Oddly enough, I remember several of my cards having a contactless option circa 2009. None of them do now. I'm not sure why, as that was a fantastically useful feature.

It's the same here in the UK.

Contactless cards are on the rise here and are incredibly convenient - moreso than Apple/Android pay, IMO. You don't have to wake a card up to use it and the batteries never run out!

http://www.theukcardsassociation.org.uk/contactless_contactl...

I'd actually argue contactless cards are ubiquitous now.

£30 in the UK, $52 AUD with a standard card. There’s some talk that Apple Pay might become effectively unlimited because it’s backed up by a biometric token too.

I'm an Australian expat and one of the surprising things I discovered is that no, you can't do that. Despite the US being technically ahead in so many areas (like internet speed), regular banking here is stone age. It's like going back in time around a decade.

Until some time last year most stores didn't even accept cards with chips (they still swiped), it's still normal to "authorize" a transaction with a signature (even with a chip) and many things you interact with (particularly landlords) still expect you to pay with pieces of paper (cheques, money orders).

Not to mention that your account numbers are closely guarded secrets because your account number is all that's needed for literally anyone to withdraw money from your account.

Admittedly, there are some areas in finance where they're kinda ahead. Micro-loans are interesting and new for example. Day to day purchases are around a decade behind though.

Can't upvote this enough. The new "insert card" bullshit is a perfect example of a small group of powerful companies having a monopoly and being completely out of touch with the wants of their users. We took an obsolete magnetic media that worked fast and efficient and somehow made the user experience much worse. Top that off with the fact that fraud protection is much better on credit card purchases thanks to automated data analysis and we end up with an inferior product that didn't really need to be upgraded in the first place. I bet this credit card insertion issue is going to become a case study for business students everywhere in a couple of years.

> I bet this credit card insertion issue is going to become a case study for business students everywhere in a couple of years.

Maybe in America. In the rest of the world, we have had chipped cards for years (Canada, Europe) and people don't have a problem using them.

And there aren't monthly mass data leaks of cards.

At least in England, same for contactless payments with cards issued by the banks.

Keep in mind, we don't have chip-and-pin like you have. We have chip-wait-print-find-a-pen-then-sign-a-paper :( I'd totally be hapaying with chip/pin

I haven't done that in so long I forgot how it used to be in the past..

I live in Germany and I think this could be simplified:

- Items are scanned

- The cashier tells you the amount

- You mention that you'll pay with your card, usually showing it is enough too

- The cashier activates the chip scanner

- You insert your card to the reader

- Wait a second or two, the screen changes to "Enter PIN"

- You enter your PIN and press the green button

- You wait around 5 seconds and hopefully it says "{success_message}\n\n Please remove your card"

- You remove the card and put it back to your wallet

- Receipt is printed, the cashier discards it if you don't take it. Sometimes they ask if you want to take it.

For purchases less than 25€ you only have to hold your card close to the reader and it will work without PIN, for amounts higher than that you also don't have to insert rhe card but again just hold it close to it and enter the PIN. At least that's the situation in Austria nowadays.

> an obsolete magnetic media that worked fast and efficient

And got erased if held too close to magnets, or got scratched and unreadable.

> and somehow made the user experience much worse

That seems to be a problem with implementation, not technology. Outside of the US, I could use contactless payment with a card for years. I could also use chip payment under a specified limit without putting in PIN. Even if all that fails, terminals which are actually connected and don't use dial up on every payment take just a few seconds to authorize each transaction.

The US payment systems dragged their feet for so long now you get to experience payments in Europe from early 00s.

According to 2014 Gallup Crime Poll, 69% of Americans worry about having their credit card info stolen, and 27% have already been hit.

And despite the anti-fraud automated data analysis, losses per $100 having been growing from 2010 to 2014, when they reached $16 billion, of which the US accounted for half, despite only generating 21% of transaction volume.

http://www.gallup.com/poll/178856/hacking-tops-list-crimes-a...

http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20150804007054/en/Glob...

Wow, this is first time I see someone claiming that chip is inferior to magnetic stripe on card. I don't even remember when I had to use magstripe… But I do remember cashiers swiping cards repeatedly and then putting them into the plasctic bag so they could be read. Zero problems with chip.

Isn't there something like Paywave there? I used it for 90% of my transactions in Canada. Only have to use Chip n Pin when going over $50.

>It felt gimmicky, like I was showing off.

the early adopter's tradeoff for all tech i suppose.

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