Apple Pay Negotiations Still Ongoing in Germany as Hints of Pending Italian Launch Increase

Germany is a market with a lot of purchasing power and I expect Apple to try and establish a cut from the transactions as high as possible, meanwhile the banks have ZERO reason to rush an agreement as long as they are all very confident that Apple is asking too much I guess.

I mean, once they negotiate a rate I'm sure it will be harder to move away from it for banks especially.

Also, Germans are VERY reluctant to change banks, so their negotiation power in this is a lot higher than most other places.

Comments like "I changed banks to have Apple Pay" would be rather rare here save for the diehard Apple fans who read about Apple Pay every month on MR et all...

Meanwhile, a range of mobile payment options have long been available. Whilst less secure, less flexible or less convenient and integrated, many of them seem to cover that basic urge to pay with the phone just fine. Another hit to the negotiation power that Apple may have.

Glassed Silver:mac

You mean, by the time Apple Pay arrives in the Netherlands it won't even be relevant anymore.;):p

I moved to Berlin ;)
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How so? I mean, I can see some QR code based system eventually coming out on top in the US (for a bunch of reasons) but I'm not sure if there's something like that in Germany.

QR code based system?? Is it 2013 again? :rolleyes:

**** Germany and **** Germans with their backwards attitudes ALL THE ****ING TIME.

Whenever something... anything really... is NEW they immediately HATE it and dismiss it as nonsense. People who use such things are ridiculed on top of everything else.

Smartphones? HAHAHAHA NO ONE needs **** like this... SOOOO useless...
Meanwhile people in all other countries start using them.
5 years later... all of a sudden... smartphones are great in Germany too... and nobody even remembers dismissing them.

Same with tablets...

Non-cash payments...

Electric cars...

The list goes on and on.

I am so fed up with the people here...

It needs to get a (Western) European rollout to be really successful, the Netherlands, Belgium, Luxemburg, Denmark, Austria e.g. need to be added as well. I understand that if you live in Berlin you don't travel abroad that easily but NRW e.g., they get around. People who live near borders easily shop in one country and have dinner in the other one these days.

**** Germany and **** Germans with their backwards attitudes ALL THE ****ING TIME.

Whenever something... anything really... is NEW they immediately HATE it and dismiss it as nonsense. People who use such things are ridiculed on top of everything else.

Smartphones? HAHAHAHA NO ONE needs **** like this... SOOOO useless...
Meanwhile people in all other countries start using them.
5 years later... all of a sudden... smartphones are great in Germany too... and nobody even remembers dismissing them.

Same with tablets...

Non-cash payments...

Electric cars...

The list goes on and on.

I am so fed up with the people here...

Sounds just like Macrumors half the time

Germany is a market with a lot of purchasing power and I expect Apple to try and establish a cut from the transactions as high as possible, meanwhile the banks have ZERO reason to rush an agreement as long as they are all very confident that Apple is asking too much I guess.

I mean, once they negotiate a rate I'm sure it will be harder to move away from it for banks especially.

Also, Germans are VERY reluctant to change banks, so their negotiation power in this is a lot higher than most other places.

Comments like "I changed banks to have Apple Pay" would be rather rare here save for the diehard Apple fans who read about Apple Pay every month on MR et all...

Meanwhile, a range of mobile payment options have long been available. Whilst less secure, less flexible or less convenient and integrated, many of them seem to cover that basic urge to pay with the phone just fine. Another hit to the negotiation power that Apple may have.

Glassed Silver:mac

The situation in Germany sounds a little like that in Australia, but to a greater extent in Germany. Here in Australia almost everyone has an NFC card and almost every were accepts NFC payments, but ApplePay is only available from one of the big four banks. It is my understanding that the issue in negotiation with three of the big banks is the transaction fee. In Australia the transaction fee is usually paid by the retailer and many retailer have a $10 minimum to pay by card or they charge the consumer 20c or 50c.

Apple design ApplePay for the US where NFC payments were still new and "cool", the problem for them is that in many other parts of the world NFC is already implemented, so Apple is in a far weaker negotiating position in relation to transaction fees.

Another issue that puts Apple is a weaker negotiating position in Germany, is the iPhone is far less popular there than US, UK or AU.


source ('https://mspoweruser.com/here-are-the-kantar-smartphone-market-share-numbers-for-march-2017/').