Mikey Campbell
During Apple's quarterly conference call for the second quarter of 2015, CEO Tim Cook announced big box electronics store Best Buy is now accepting Apple Pay through its app and will roll out in-store support later this year.
Netting Best Buy is a coup for Apple Pay as the company is a major contributor to the Merchant Customer Exchange (MCX) consortium, a group of retailers that actively repelled Apple's NFC payments solution at its stores. MCX plans to market its own mobile payments system in CurrentC, though the solution is thought to be more cumbersome and less secure than Apple Pay.
Notably, MCX partners CVS and Rite Aid switched off Apple Pay compatibility at previously compatible NFC point of sale terminals shortly after the service launched in October. The companies later said the move was in line with MCX policy.
Other MCX partners include Walmart, CVS, The Gap and other popular chains.
Speaking on the issue, MCX CEO Dekkers Davidson said in November that it had partner members' best interests in mind by blocking Apple Pay in favor of CurrentC.
"There are consequences, so if you decide to not keep the agreement that you made with the other merchants we're not going to put a lot of energy in helping get those merchants launched in the near term," Davidson said.
Best Buy is expected to roll out in-app Apple Pay support today, with in-store NFC compatibility to come later this year.
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Malcolm Owen
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43 Comments
Predictable. CVS up next. Then Target.
They should've already jumped on the Apple Pay bandwagon. Why wait for people to patronize the competition?
That happened sooner than I thought. CurrectC hasn't even fully launched yet. I thought Best Buy would let it flounder for at least a year before they begrudgingly accepted Apple Pay.
I think Target should jump in now, get a good size head start on Walmart. Seems like a perfect opportunity for them. I would switch to Target tomorrow if they did. Would also like it if one of the gas stations near me accepted it, then I could legitimately leave my credit card home.
Can't believe it's taken this long! For a tech retailer, they are so far behind. No form of epayment and they can't even scan their loyalty card from Passbook or even from their own app!