Apple Pay stumbles as major US retailers block NFC transactions awaiting QR code pay app CurrentC
Apple’s mobile wallet has been delivered a blow after a consortium of US retailers, with their own payment app in the works, dropped NFC payments from their stores, a move which fully disables Apple Pay.
Apple Pay was designed to replace the wallet
Apple's NFC payment app, which was launched in the US on 20 September, has been blocked by Walmart, 7-Eleven, Kmart, Best Buy, RiteAid, CVS and more, as they await the release of CurrentC, a mobile payment app being developed in a joint venture of the firms, according to the Verge.
CurrentC will launch in 2015 and will charge users' accounts directly with the scan of a QR code - taking a different route from Apple’s NFC payments.
Pharmaceutical groups RiteAid and CVS are among the latest to drop NFC payments from their outlet terminals - to deny rival Apple any leverage in their stores.
Meanwhile Apple's market is shrinking with a reported 110,000 retailers across the US already onboard for CurrentC.
The QR code payment app has a mass of partners including Gap, 7-Eleven, Dunkin' Donuts, Sears, Kmart, Bed, Bath and Beyond, Wendy's and others, set to challenge the limited uptake Apple Pay has seen.
Topping off a difficult launch week for Apple’s revolutionary app, the NFC payment system saw Bank of America customers charged twice for some transactions after purchases were accidentally duplicated.
Masahiro Hara, the inventor of the QR code, earlier this year predicted that QR codes would be extinct within a decade, bringing into question the retailers’ choice to use this approach.
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