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Walmart Now Lets You Pay With Phone At All 4,600 US Stores Via Walmart Pay (cnet.com)

An anonymous reader writes: Walmart will now let customers make purchases with their phone at all 4,600 of its stores in the U.S. The feature is called Walmart Pay and it works by letting the cashier scan a QR code on a customer's phone screen to complete their payment. The technology is different than Apple, Samsung, and Android Pay, which involves tapping your phone next to a payment terminal with NFC. The company wants to make shopping easier and faster, and with its own payment app, Walmart can get insights into consumer behavior, though it says it won't use the data without a shopper's permission. Walmart says no payment information is stored on users' phones or at registers -- card information is stored on Walmart servers. Note: Samsung Pay also uses magnetic secure transmission (MST) to make purchases. When a smartphone with Samsung Pay is held against a register with a magnetic stripe terminal, the phone emits a magnetic signal that simulates the magnetic strip found on the back of a credit or debit card.

13 of 118 comments (clear)

  1. no thanks.. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

    i'm waiting for Apple Pay

  2. Fuck That by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Insightful

    One more fucking way to pay that isn't convenient everywhere. Fuck Walmart.

    captcha: simplify (go figure)

  3. Usage is consent by thoromyr · · Score: 5, Insightful

    "Walmart can get insights into consumer behavior, though it says it won't use the data without a shopper's permission." ...and using Walmart Pay will be considered consent. But I guess the honest statement of "we will data mine the fuck out of all purchase information we can snag, and by using Walmart Pay you maximize our opportunity" doesn't sound so nice.

    1. Re:Usage is consent by Tyrannosaur · · Score: 2

      How would using a plastic card be any different? Unless you use a different credit card every time or use cash for everything, the companies track you through your credit card number.

      Yes we should be wary of spying and tracking and youhaveit, but let's not delude ourselves that this technology isn't decades old already.

    2. Re:Usage is consent by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Apple Pay and Android Pay do not give the merchant the real credit card number. They use a tokenized deal that will be different and cannot allow them to track. So the big businesses don't like it. Also, the Walmart deal will be connected to your bank and not to a credit card. Thus, by causing some danger to you (by having this info available to be exfiltrated), they get out of paying the credit card processing fee. Yeah for Walmart, bad for the customer...

  4. Re:Wow! by Holi · · Score: 2

    What do you mean, you have them save your credit card info on their servers, which means their servers are a one stop shop for hackers.

    --
    Sorry, teleporters just kill you and then make a copy. A perfect, soul-less copy.
  5. What a relief! by PopeRatzo · · Score: 2

    I was worried that shopping for pickles and 32-packs of toilet paper would actually require me to engage the muscles in my hand to reach into my pocket and pull out a credit card. Those things aren't exactly light you know. Well, they are light, but thank God I won't have to go through all that any more. I'll be able to just cruise past the checkout in my mobility scooter and wave my Consumers Cellular phone and be on my way.

    --
    You are welcome on my lawn.
    1. Re:What a relief! by PopeRatzo · · Score: 3, Interesting

      And by "credit card", you mean the insecure, expensive, fraud-prone payment mechanism created by a small number of monopolistic companies and their government cronies; you know, what arrogant rich people like you use.

      Naw, man. I use currency. I just figured that would be way to much work for your average Wal-Mart shopper, what with the counting and the gazintas and everything. Plus, those bills get heavy, you know, and the average Wal-Mart shopper has the muscle definition of a frond under all that avoirdupois.

      And before you ask me for a citation...

      http://www.peopleofwalmart.com...

      --
      You are welcome on my lawn.
  6. Re:Walmart by JoeyRox · · Score: 3, Insightful

    I try not to be elitist about this sort of thing

    If you have to exert effort to not appear elitist then you're an elitist so might as well own it. Back in the real world, Walmart's food prices are significantly below the supermarket chains and allow families to feed themselves with better quality food than what would otherwise be possible if they had to pay higher prices. The harsh realities of how poor feed themselves might not make for touchy, feel-good sentiments but it makes for full bellies.

  7. walmart pay is slow by renegade600 · · Score: 5, Informative

    I have used Walmart pay several times and in spite of Walmart promises of faster checkout - it is slower to check out. By the time you unlock the phone, navigate to the walmart app, scroll down to get to walmart pay, verify your identity, scan the keypad, wait for approval, you could have scanned your debit card and be done with it. Walmart pay should at least have a widget to make eliminate a few steps.

    the keypad even timeout on me a few times while getting to the app and had to get the cashier reinitialized walmart pay.

    I wish my bank used samsung pay, it is so much faster and I have used it at walmart a couple of times using credit card with no problems..

  8. Re:Walmart by Trailer+Trash · · Score: 4, Insightful

    They sell the same stuff as the other grocery stores around here, just at lower prices. The produce is sourced locally where possible (like Kroger and Publix).

    Why do you think they sell different stuff?

    Or are you the typical cluefuck elitist who thinks that only organic overpriced stuff from Whole Foods is "healthy"?

  9. Re:Walmart by sexconker · · Score: 2

    It's all about the Benjamins, although I don't suppose we can call them that if we're paying with a phone app.

    It's all about the Tubmans.

  10. Re:Walmart by david_thornley · · Score: 2

    And, since Walmart puts downward pressure on wages, it creates more poor people to need to shop at Walmart. It's the cycle of nature. Or something.

    --
    "When you have eliminated the unacceptable, whatever is left, however improbable, must be the truthiness" - Holmes