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Comment by jaywalk | Hacker News Reader

Does Android support broad enough third-party access to NFC to allow a payment system to work?

Good question.

I think Wells Fargo actually did used to have their own Android Pay alternative within their own app, but they've discontinued it, and now you have to add their cards directly into Google Pay.

If you go into "Settings", "Apps & notifications", "Advanced": "Default apps", "Tap & pay", then you can select either "Google Pay" or another app that you may have. I think "Wells Fargo" app used to show up there back when they supported contactless within their app.

Most of the Dutch banks have their own payment apps that work with NFC and traditional pin machines.

And most of them suck to the point that it's easier to just stick the NFC card in your phone case and use it that way.

This seems to be almost universal for banking apps. Aside from those of some of the huge national banks, in the US bank apps tend to be lowest-bidder barely functional junk.

Yes, it has APIs for ISO 14443 parts 3 and 4 which are needed for implemented payment solutions.

https://developer.android.com/guide/topics/connectivity/nfc/...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ISO/IEC_14443

Yes, one of my banks does support using my CC for payment by NFC for Android 5.0 and up. I remember this because I'm annoyed that they don't support Apple Pay.

That said, I've seen exactly once someone using and Android phone to pay contactless. It was a huge pain, they tried multiple times.

Samsung Pay's Magnetic Stripe Emulation is much cooler, it's like magic. Unfortunately, magnetic stripes are a legacy tech.

Yes. My bank offers NFC payments through their own app instead of Google Pay.

It does. Not full access, but it can allow payment.

Barclays do this in the UK and it's awful, no idea why they don't just go through GP when everybody else does.

Barclay's implementation of it may be awful, but I'd much rather use a bank's implementation directly than give Google direct access to information about all of my transactions.

Banks want to "own the customer" by providing their own "differentiated" UX. What they only realize later is that they can't develop UX that's competitive with Apple or Google.

The AMEX app supposedly can use it, although the problem then becomes finding shops that support it. After a while I just ended up adding the card to Google Pay, which seems more reliable.

I use my banks own android app to add my cards and pay via nfc on android. I live in an EU country where android pay is not available. Therefore yes android allows it.

It does, Volksbank Germany offers a dedicated app for NFC payments that does not use Google Pay

It does, they will show as alternative payment providers in Settings.

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