Google's Android Pay Mobile Payments Service Arrives In US

An anonymous reader writes: Google is rolling out its digital payment system Android Pay in the U.S. today. The new system will allow users to make payments in stores using their phone. Existing users of the Google Wallet app can access Android Pay through an update. According to the blog post: "Android Pay works with all NFC-enabled Android devices (running KitKat 4.4+), on any mobile carrier, at every tap and pay ready location across the US. Android Pay will support credit and debit cards from the four major payment networks: American Express, Discover, MasterCard and Visa. These cards are issued by many of the most popular US banks and credit unions, including American Express, Bank of America, Discover, Navy Federal Credit Union, PNC, Regions Bank, USAA, and U.S. Bank. Wells Fargo will be available in the next few days, Capital One and Citi are coming soon, and we're adding new banks all the time."

Comments

So how is this different

[TechyImmigrant]

This sounds like Google Wallet, with a different name. Same technology.

What is new?

Re:So how is this different

[Anonymous Coward]

Google Wallet is being split into this for tap-and-pay and a new version which only handles sending/receiving cash via email.

Re:So how is this different

[viperidaenz]

USA will catch up some day, the rest of the world has a crap-load of contactless terminals. I bought my lunch using one half an hour ago.

Re:So how is this different

[oakgrove]

Didn't Google Pay require carrier's blessing?

According to the blog post cited in the summary above, this works on all carriers.

Re:So how is this different

[tlhIngan]

This sounds like Google Wallet, with a different name. Same technology.

Completely opposite, actually.

Google Pay works like Apple Pay - i.e., it's an implementation of EMV.

Google Wallet works with Bank of America. What happens in this case is when you set up Google Wallet, BoA creates a debit card in your name for your account. Whenever you use Google Wallet, the debit account details are sent to the merchant, who tries to debit the account. Since the account has no money, BoA forwards a money request to Google, who then funds the account from the various payment methods you have (Google charges you for the money, that money goes to BoA to fund the debit account which then goes to the merchant). With this method, any payment system works - as long as Google can charge it, it can be used. Not all merchants support it though.

Using EMV means all merchants who support EMV can accept Google/Apple Pay. However, to do it requires support of the bank to have the infrastructure necessary to create on-demand tokens, which is why it doesn't support all banks.

In addition, Google Wallet incurs double interchange fees - first from the debit charge, then from your payment mechanism charge. In the beginning, Google was absorbing the payment card charge (since the merchant was absorbing the debit charge as per a normal debit transaction).

Google Pay is like Apple Pay - just a regular electronic credit card, so only one fee is charged. And this method also ensures the transaction details stay private since Google is no longer involved in the transaction.

Basically, Apple Pay forced banks to support EMV, which means Google Pay was actually possible. And Apple Pay works because of the October mandate for more secure payment cards, forcing merchants to abandon swipe readers for ones that support Chip+PIN and which often come with NFC readers installed as well.

annoyances at the checkout counter

[Dorianny]

Starting with long lines and ending with rude, overworked, less-then-knowledgeable cashiers the payment method whether cash, plastic or nfc is the least of the annoyances.

no support for the big two?

[TheGratefulNet]

mastercharge and bank americard?

how did they miss the big two?

how odd!

Re:no support for the big two?

[LynnwoodRooster]

Screw that, I'm still trying to find some place to use my Diner's Card!

Go Google!

[Maury Markowitz]

> The new system will allow users to make payments in stores using their phone

They just keep hitting it out of the park!

excuse me, may i use your phone?

[turkeydance]

and your entire existence?

Re:excuse me, may i use your phone?

[linuxguy]

Is your entire existence in your phone? Or are you being ridiculous?

Has this ever happened to you?

[linuxguy]

There have been a couple of times when I left home without my wallet and went to the store and realized, oh crap, no wallet. But I had my phone on me. For those times, it certainly would be convenient to have the ability to pay with my phone.

Oh and another big one. Receipts. Freaking lots of them. I would much rather have all that in a neat list inside my phone that I can pull and review. Between multiple credit cards, cash and checks etc, I would not be able to figure out how much money I spent last week or last month. But with completely electronic payments, things get a lot more manageable.

This service is obviously not for the paranoid who think that Google and Feds already have too much of their information. They probably should stick to paper money.

Rewards

[heezer7]

My issue with Wallet before was credit card rewards. Everything came across as a generic category so say my Amex higher % cash back at grocery stores didn't register properly. Hopefully that is corrected now that the banks are in on it. If so I'll be all over it.

Android Pay... but why? Bye Google.

[A non moose cow]

They are splitting the current Google Wallet app into two different apps; Android Pay, and the New Google Wallet. Google's blurb on this states that they are splitting it into "two simpler apps", which, while correct for the individual apps, actually makes using the functionality more complicated, because you have to remember which app can do which kinds of transactions. They also have a FAQ that answers all of the questions that their pow-wow thought might be frequently asked (Lets not kid ourselves, we all know that these lists are actually MBFAQs), but they did not include the one I wanted to ask: Why are they doing this?

I think I might have the answer to this, and it is a universal one from Google. As a frequently frustrated user of many other Google services, having asked dozens of questions about why seemingly nonsensical changes have been made to various services, and never having received a reasonable answer for a single one of them, Google's universal answer to the question "Why?" is simply, "Fuck You. That's why."

I have been slowly transferring my data off of other Google services for the last 6 months. I used Google Wallet just today before reading about this new idiocy. I'm probably going to miss this phone swipe ability, but I'm not changing to the new app. I am tired of the Google culture of disposability. There have been too many things that they made, and that I enjoyed, and that they then trashed. What they need to realize is that not offering any explanation for things like this makes me as a customer feel trashed. Bye Google. You finally broke this camel's back.

Re:Cash, thanks.

[b0bby]

I get 2% back on gas on my credit card, and at least 1% everywhere else. Other than gas stations, you're paying the card fee either way, so I figure why not use a card?