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The U.S. monopoly on Apple Pay could soon be coming to an end. The Wall Street Journal reports that the mobile payment system is likely to arrive in Canada this fall.
The company is reportedly courting six Canadian banks: Royal Bank of Canada, Toronto-Dominion Bank, Bank of Nova Scotia, Bank of Montreal, Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce, and National Bank of Canada.
It’s unclear whether Apple has been able to sign agreements with any of these banks yet.
Apple Pay first rolled out to iPhone 6 and 6 Plus in October as a component of iOS 8.1. The app allows users to pay for goods both on mobile and in-store with a few taps and a fingerprint scan. So far the mobile payment service doesn’t seem to be catching on with consumers, however. A report from earlier this year found that only six percent of iPhone 6 and 6 Plus users had ever used Apple Pay.
Aside from consumer adoption, banks in Canada may have other reasons to be hesitant about signing up for Apple Pay. There have been a number of incidents in which fraudsters were able to link stolen credit cards to Apple Pay accounts, creating a big problem for banks. In most cases, if not all, it was a failure on the bank’s part for not having the appropriate infrastructure to verify Apple Pay accounts. Still, it’s a looming issue that banks in Canada will have to deal with if they decide to work with Apple.
Agencies/Canadajournal
