Russian Apple Pay expands with nine more financial institutions

Apple engaged in a massive expansion of its Russian Apple Pay support on Tuesday, officially adding nine more financial institutions as payment options.

The new backers include Tinkoff Bank, Bank Saint Petersburg, Raiffeisenbank, Yandex.Money, Alfa-Bank, MTS Bank, VTB 24, Rocketbank, and MDM Bank. Previously Apple's only active financial partners in the country were MasterCard and Sberbank.

Retail support has so far included the likes of ATAK, Auchan, Azbuka Vkusa, BP, Magnit, Media Markt, M.Video, and TsUM, as well as Apple reseller re:Store. Chains like Burger King are set to launch support in the future.

Since first launching in the U.S. in Oct. 2014, Apple Pay has come to a number of other regions like Canada, China, France, and Japan. Even in the U.S., however, there can be important support gaps — while the country has hundreds of banks and credit unions onboard, retailers have been slow to sign on because many lack the infrastructure for NFC-based payments. Some merchants, like Anthropologie and Forever 21, have promised support for years without delivering.

5 Comments

applesauce007 1702 comments · 17 Years

About 8 years ago

Rock and Roll...
Let's get it implemented on every website checkout before the holidays!
Go Apple Go!

SpamSandwich 32917 comments · 19 Years

Anyone who posts here who lives in Russia, I have a question. Do people tend to use cash there, versus credit cards?

boltsfan17 2294 comments · 12 Years

SpamSandwich said:

Anyone who posts here who lives in Russia, I have a question. Do people tend to use cash there, versus credit cards?

I'm not Russian, but from my experiences visiting there, people use cash. Credit cards aren't widely accepted, especially outside the tourist cities like Moscow and St. Petersburg. Even in cites, lots of places don't accept credit cards.

Soviet Pooh 1 comment · 8 Years

SpamSandwich said:

Anyone who posts here who lives in Russia, I have a question. Do people tend to use cash there, versus credit cards?

I live in Russia and I can say that the majority of us Russians use cash indeed. Needless to say that wireless purchases remain rare oddity - and I ain't even talking about Apple Pay here. In fact today I myself enabled Apple Pay on my phone for the first time (due to the aforementioned Apple expansion) and made my first purchase with it - the girl on cash desk was utterly surprised and couldn't believe that I had just bought something WITH MY PHONE (TBH I experienced similiar feelings, it was just awesome).
But in such megapolises as Moscow and St-Petersberg it becomes a common thing which is definitely good.