http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-36320321
Android Pay in UK: A tipping point for mobile payments?
Rory Cellan-Jones tries out Android Pay
Google is launching Android Pay, its tap-and-go contactless payment service, in
the UK.
Nearly 60% of the country's smartphone users own an Android handset.
Devices running Android 4.4 or higher and fitted with an NFC (near field
communication) chip will be able to use the service.
The firm said it had chosen the UK as the next place to offer mobile payments
because of British familiarity with contactless payments.
Until now, the facility had only been available in the US.
Apple Pay has been in use in the UK since last summer, with thousands of retail
outlets - from sandwich shops to the London Underground - now accustomed to
customers using their phones to pay.
Android Pay Google Android Pay makes use of handsets' NFC chips
I've had a preview of the Android Pay app, and if anything it is even simpler
to use once you have uploaded your cards to the app.
Your phone has to have some kind of lock - a fingerprint, or pattern or Pin
code - but when the device is on, you don't even need the app to be open to
tap-and-pay on a contactless terminal.
For now, just as with Apple Pay, most retailers will only allow payments up to
£30 using your phone. The promise is that a software upgrade to payment
terminals will allow higher amounts, although you will then need to use your
unlock method to authorise the transaction.
Given that Apple last year listed a number of retailers that would be accepting
higher payments, and only a handful have so far done that, I would be surprised
if there is rapid progress on this front.
At launch, many Visa and Mastercard credit and debit cards will work with the
app, although Barclays customers will not be able to use Android Pay. That is
because the bank is going it alone, making contactless payments available
through its own mobile banking app.
Samsung Pay Getty Images Samsung Pay is already active in the US and South
Korea
To add to the confusion - or perhaps choice - the leading maker of Android
phones is launching its own payments service. Samsung Pay arrives in the UK
"later this year" and, according to a spokesman, will offer a uniquely simple
solution combined with special offers for users.
Here's where the closed nature of Apple's operating system, compared to
Android, may prove an advantage - for Tim Cook's business at least.
I'm sure that Barclays would prefer that its iPhone-wielding customers could
use its mobile banking app to make contactless payments, but because Apple does
not allow outsiders to come anywhere near the NFC functionality on its phone
that is not possible.
So, is this the moment when the dream of your phone becoming a mobile wallet -
promised for at least a decade - becomes a reality?
Barclays Android app Barclays Barclays plans to offer its own wave-and-pay
facility to Android users from June
That was supposed to happen with Apple Pay but a source in the payments
industry tells me that was a bit premature. "Last time I looked at our figures,
one in 10 payments was contactless, but fewer than one in a 100 were from a
mobile phone," he said.
But he went on to point out that contactless cards, first launched in the UK in
2008, had also been slow to take off. The decision of Transport for London,
Europe's biggest single retailer, to allow the use of contactless credit and
debit cards on buses and tube trains, had been the tipping point.
Nowadays, shop staff in the capital seem embarrassed when they tell you that
they cannot take contactless payments.
Android ay at tube station Google Commuters will be able to use Android Pay to
make use of London's public transport
Android Pay, with a huge potential audience in the UK, could do for the mobile
wallet what TfL did for contactless cards. For the first time, just about
anyone who owns a smartphone can use it to pay.
If they discover it is simple, convenient and that they can get access to money
saving deals via their phones, then paying by card could begin to look as
old-fashioned as writing a cheque.
