Visa: Canada a World Leader in NFC Payments, Mobile eCommerce Taking Off

Apple pay wallet

There has been much hype around mobile payments lately, and the launch of Apple Pay just spilled gas on the fire. As a result, we’ve seen Canadians pay for their purchases at Tim Hortons and Subway with their iPhone 6 (and US credit cards), so every tech-savvy user is wondering when Apple Pay will become available in Canada. But that’s not the case for the majority of Canadians: a recent GfK survey shows they are lukewarm when it comes to mobile payments.

As it turns out, earlier this year PayPal only surveyed the Canadians who were ready to leave their wallets at home and pay with their mobile phones. Their study published earlier this year painted a totally different picture than the recent GfK study. As the Edmonton Journal highlights, “Canadians are still apprehensive about using their phone in lieu of cash, debit, or credit cards,” mostly because of security fears, but they also seem to be lukewarm because they already have plenty of ways to pay in stores.

Visa and MasterCard have conducted their own studies in Canada, and all three recent surveys seem to agree that roughly a quarter of Canadians have used their mobile devices to make online purchases in the past. According to MasterCard, they predict Apple Pay will normalize payments in Canada when it launches, speaking with MobileSyrup.

From Visa’s study, we find that Canada is the world leader in mobile NFC and QR payments. MasterCard revealed earlier that Canada is technologically ready to accept Apple Pay.

“Canada is a world leader in mobile NFC and QR payments. It is very encouraging to see solid awareness of NFC payments as well as that upwards of 26 per cent of Canadians are beginning to use their mobile devices for online ecommerce payments,” said Derek Colfer, Head of Innovation and Technology, Visa Canada. “The mobile industry has advanced incredibly over the past five years and with more consumer education and awareness, Canadians can look forward to fully embracing mobile commerce and payments within our market. The migration to mobile ecommerce payments is well underway.”

However, Apple needs to ink a deal with local banking partners to finally launch it. China is one step ahead already, since Apple has launched Apple Pay for in-app purchases in a partnership with UnionPay.

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