Swiss banks give up the resistance against Apple

have Long resisted the banks against the invaders. Now it is cooperating. At the end of April, customers of the Credit Suisse be able to use your credit cards for the payment service, Apple Pay, announced the big Bank. Card Issuer the joint venture, swisscard, which is part of Credit Suisse and American Express.

"With the extension of the offer, we meet the need of our customers to have more flexibility in the case of payments online and with mobile devices – also abroad," explains Anke Bridge, Haux, head of the digitisation and products of the Bank. Already at the beginning of the week, CS was announced, to make Samsung Pay the credit card customers.

A case for the competition authorities

a Long time, the Swiss banks had tried Apple Pay out of Switzerland. The dispute reached its peak last November, when the competition Commission (Weko) conducted raids at UBS, Credit Suisse and Postfinance. The competition Commission is the suspicion that the banks would not have agreed, your credit card unlock for Apple Pay. Thus, the own mobile payment Twint should be protected, so the presumption.

Apple Pay in July 2016 in Switzerland was launched, it could be used for the Service first, with any map of a large Swiss Bank. According to industry experts, the banks could afford to do, because as soon as a customer would change banks to Apple Pay.

Apple blocks interface

As a reaction to the Start of the foreign Payment Apps, the big Swiss banks joined together and started the beginning of 2017 your payment solution Twint. This will, in turn, slows down by Apple. Because Apple refuses to Twint access to the NFC interface of the iPhone . NFC stands for Near Field Communication and enables, by a simple Turn of the mobile phone to a payment terminal, a payment trigger.

Twint users need to take pictures of so tedious a QR-Code or Bluetooth with the payment terminal to connect. Because of the disability of Twint, the Swiss consumer therefore lodged a protective claim with the competition Commission against Apple.

now covered by Credit Suisse of its own payment solution Twint in the back, because the big Bank is also introducing Apple Pay? "We continue to Twint," said a spokeswoman. But Twint was of a purely national solution, therefore, customers would also want to be able to Apple Pay, in foreign countries have to pay. So seen, be Twint payment solutions from Apple and Samsung supplements.

Twint is shown in a relaxed

fear Twint has not that Apple and Samsung Pay could eventually push the Swiss solution from the market. "We are happy about everyone who brings mobile payments in Switzerland", says a Twint-speaker. Twint have now 1.3 million registered customers, of which 500’000 frequent users of the Payment to be App.

UBS is negotiating, apparently, still with Apple: "We offer our customers in addition to UBS Twint already today, a variety of mobile payment solutions such as Swatch, Pay, Fitbit Pay and Garmin Pay. In addition, we are working to expand our offerings in the current year," said the big Bank.

Postfinance is working on a new App

In the case of post Finance, there are currently no plans on Apple Pay: "We have launched Twint own Payment and Shopping App. We focus particularly on their development," said a spokesman on the question of whether Postfinance wool also introduce Apple Pay.

Instead, the post-work with Finance to digitize the own credit and debit cards. From the autumn of 2019 should be an own App for Android Smartphones, mobile payments possible.

more Apps

The range of mobile payment solutions is always greater: It has not, the Pay with mobile phone. So, Twint, the biggest Problem is not in the American competitors, but in the Swiss population.

Because they paid for is still in 70 percent of cases, with cash. 20 percent of the payments will be done with the debit cards. The Rest with credit cards or with solutions such as the Twint. According to a study by the University of Lucerne in mobile payment have currently a market share of 0.5 per cent of the Payment transactions.

(editing Tamedia)

Created: 18.04.2019, 13:32 PM