Apple Pay to enter Czech and Slovakia markets
Apple Pay has been gradually expanding across Europe, Asia, and the Middle East. The service launched in Belgium and Kazakhstan in November, made its long-awaited debut in Germany last month and is “coming soon” in Saudi Arabia. Apple Pay Czech
Apple Pay first launched in the United States in October 2014 and has since expanded to many regions, including the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia, Belgium, China, Singapore, Switzerland, France, Germany, Japan, Spain, Italy, Sweden, Finland, Denmark, Russia, New Zealand, Brazil, Poland, Ireland, and Ukraine.
The main obstacle towards expansion is negotiation with banks. Apple claims a fractional fee from each Apple Pay transaction, which can amount to millions of dollars over time. Banks are often loathing to lose that revenue, but also want to be seen as meeting demand for mobile payment options.
Apple Pay Czech could arrive around the end of February or beginning of March, starting with five banks. Czech banks said they are ready to offer Apple Pay immediately after its launch in the Czech Republic. The first group of banks to support it include Česká spořitelna, mBank, Komerční banka, Moneta and AirBank.
Other banks that expressed interest include Equabank, Creditas, Raiffeisenbank, and ČSOB.
The banks making this new service available to clients include Slovakia’s biggest bank Slovenská Sporiteľňa, Tatra Banka, mBank, J&T Banka, etc. VÚB Banka and others plan to launch this service later.
“Slovakia was historically a pioneer in the launching of contactless payments and was one of the first countries where contactless payments became a common method of payment,” said Zdeněk Románek, member of the Slovenská Sporiteľňa Board of Directors, responsible for retail banking when introducing Apple Pay.
During the first day of Apple Pay in Slovakia, as many as 9,655 clients of Slovenská Sporiteľňa registered with the service. They made 12,734 tokenisations in total, which means that some of them registered more cards or more devices.Apple Pay Czech
