Dan Balaban's blog

Apple Joins Conference Circuit and Hype Happens; And is Apple Pay Cash a Threat to Banks?

NFC TIMES Exclusive Insight –LAS VEGAS: Perhaps to both preserve its mystique and avoid leaks, Apple has scrupulously avoided speaking or exhibiting at trade shows and conferences over the years.

NFC Mobile Transactions Growing but Still Have a Long Way to Go in UK

NFC TIMES Exclusive Insight – While large UK processor Worldpay is exalting the growth of NFC mobile payments in the UK during the first six months of 2017, it’s important to note that NFC phone transactions still make up a small percentage of total in-store card transactions.

What are Eurosmart and SIMalliance Trying to Hide with Their Latest NFC Figures?: Low or Nonexistent Growth

NFC TIMES Exclusive – The smart card industry has seen better days. Gone are the reports of double-digit annual growth in shipments, fueled by the industry’s twin engines of SIM and EMV banking cards.

Tip Sheet: Visa’s Deadlines for Ending Support for Alternate PANs Apply Globally

NFC TIMES Exclusive – As NFC Times has reported, Visa has set precise deadlines for ending support for alternate PANs and any other form of “tokenization” that doesn’t comply with the tokenization technical framework set by EMVCo, the specifications body owned by the global networks.

Tip Sheet: Visa Relents on Alternate PANs in Taiwan, but Phase-Out Rule Stands; Will Big European Banks Comply?

NFC Times Exclusive – Visa has taken a more aggressive approach than Mastercard to ending support for alternate PANs, which it considers an impediment to its ultimate goal of converting all Visa-branded cards loaded onto smartphones and other devices to tokens complying with the EMVCo tokenization framework–preferably using its own Visa Token Service.

Tip Sheet: UnionPay Not Too Forgiving of Samsung for its Deal with Alipay

NFC Times Exclusive – As if Samsung doesn’t have enough problems, NFC Times has learned that China UnionPay is having a hard time forgiving the device maker for adding support for UnionPay rival Alipay in its Samsung Pay wallet in China.

Tip Sheet: Visa Opens Some Tokenization Tasks to Vendors but Keeps Control of Core TSP Function

NFC Times Exclusive Insight – We have terms, such as trusted service manager, or TSM, and token service provider, or TSP, to describe roles in the digital payments ec

Anderson, Lambert Keep Top Posts Under Lyons in MasterCard’s Reorganized Emerging Payments Unit

NFC Times Exclusive – The structure of MasterCard’s recently reorganized emerging payments unit is becoming clearer, with the payment scheme taking another stab at revamping the unit, which it considers key to its future growth, NFC Times has learned.

Tip Sheet: Apple Holds Line on Transaction Fee Demands in Certain Countries

NFC Times Exclusive – While Apple is believed to have offered Chinese financial institutions a price break on the cut of transaction fees it demands for participating in Apple Pay, the tech giant doesn’t appear to have extended the same offer to banks in some other countries.

Tip Sheet: Vodafone Tries Proxy Play Again, This Time with PayPal; MasterCard Executive Departs

NFC Times Exclusive – No, PayPal is not supporting NFC, contrary to what has been widely reported by the content aggregator publications the past week, as part of its announcement of a deal with Vodafone.

HEADLINE NEWS

Australian Transit Agency to Launch Mobility-as-a-Service Trial as It Pursues Long-Term MaaS Strategy

Plans by Transport for New South Wales, Australia’s largest transit agency, to launch a trial enabling users to plan, book and pay for multimodal rides is the next step toward the agency’s long-ter

Updated: U.S. Transit Agency Seeks to Reduce–Though Not Eliminate–Cash Acceptance with New Fare-Collection System

Updated: The Spokane Transit Authority in Washington state confirmed that its new fare-collection system will include contactless open-loop payments–with a beta test planned for next October, a spokesman told NFC Times' sister publication Mobility Payments.

UK Government Seeks to Bring London-Style Contactless Fare Payments System to Other Regions

The UK government’s plan to equip 700 rail stations over the next three years to accept contactless open-loop payments is a major initiative, as it seeks to replicate the success of London’s contactless pay-as-you go fare payments system elsewhere in the country–a goal that has proved elusive in the past.

More Cities in Finland Expected to Move to Open-Loop Fare Payments

A fourth city in Finland is beginning to roll out contactless open-loop payments, with “more in the pipeline,” according to one supplier on the project, making the Nordic country one of the latest hotspots for the technology.

Moscow Metro Expands Test of ‘Virtual Troika’ in Pays Wallets, as It Continues to Develop Digital-Payments Services

Moscow Metro is recruiting more users to test its “Virtual Troika” card in two NFC wallets, those supporting Google Pay and Samsung Pay, as one of the world’s largest subway operators continues to seek more ways for its customers to pay for rides.

Ohio Transit Agency Expects Significant Revenue Loss as it Builds Equity with Fare Capping

The Central Ohio Transit Authority, or COTA, officially launched its new digital-payments service Monday, including a fare-capping feature that the agency estimates will cost it $1.8 million per year in lost fare revenue, the agency confirmed to Mobility Payments.

Special Report: Interest Grows in ‘White-Label EMV’ for Closed-Loop Transit Cards

As more transit agencies introduce open-loop fare payments, interest is starting to grow in use of white-label EMV cards that agencies can issue in place of proprietary closed-loop cards for riders who don’t have bank cards or don’t want to use them to pay fares.

Swedish Transit Agency Launches Express Mode Feature for Apple Pay, though Most Ticketing Still with Barcode-Based App

Skånetrafiken, the transit agency serving one of Sweden’s largest counties, announced today it has expanded its contactless open-loop payments service to include the Express Mode feature for Apple Pay.

Major Bus Operators in Hong Kong Now Accepting Open-Loop Payments–Adding More Competition for Octopus

Two more bus operators in Hong Kong on Saturday launched acceptance of open-loop contactless fare payments, with both also accepting QR code-based mobile ticketing–as the near ubiquitous closed-loop Octopus card continues to see more competition.

Moscow Metro Launches Full Rollout of ‘Face Pay;’ Largest Biometric Payments Service of Its Kind

Touting it as the largest rollout of biometric payments in the world, Moscow Metro launched its high-profile “Face Pay” service Friday, as expected, and predicted that 10% to 15% would regularly us

Indonesian Capital Seeks to Expand to Multimodal Fare Collection and MaaS

Indonesia’s capital Jakarta, whose metropolitan area is home to more than 30 million people, is notorious for its stifling traffic congestion. In response, the government metro and light-rail networks and now it is funding an expansion of the fare-collection system to enable more multimodal payments and to build a mobility-as-a-service platform.

Exclusive: NFC Wallets Grow as Share of Contactless Fare Payments and Not Only Because of Covid

Transit agencies that have rolled out open-loop contactless payments are seeing growing use of NFC wallets to pay fares, as Covid-wary passengers see convenience in tapping their phones or wearables to pay.