If this occurred in the USA, I'm surprised the story doesn't end with the waiter asking this guy to take his Apple Watch off so the waiter can take it to the back where the payment terminal is located. Portable terminals that are brought to the table (so the customer can enter their PIN) still seem to be a rare occurrence in the US.

It's a miracle that you don't pay with checks at restaurants.

For some reason I have started seeing them a lot more lately and I am not in a tech hub. Perhaps having to upgrade to chip readers, the restaurants were able to get the portable readers as well?

Or too many servers were skimming cards on their way back to the PoS terminal

Ingenico makes portable card readers

You can pay using Apple Pay at restaurants? Has to be a special case right?

I've done this loads of times. Albeit in the UK and Canada, where the card reader is brought to your table.

Just to add that, at least here in France, it is not at all uncommon to stand up and go pay at the terminal on the way out, instead of waiting at the table. They usually have a card reader anyway, but it's a matter of convenience for the restaurant I think.

(Tbf I'm talking about everyday restaurant, not gastronomic experiences)

Sure you can. It's not a special case. That's the beauty of Apple Pay. Industry standard protocol. If the merchant accepts contactless credit cards then Apple Pay will work. No need for any special hardware, any special software or any contract changes.

Typically in the US the waiter will take your credit card back to a payment terminal rather than bringing a card reader to you. Contactless isn’t really an option in that case.

No wonder you have more problems with fraud in the USA if you let a waiter take the card away from you and do god knows what with it.

Why would you hand anyone your credit card... to take it somewhere else... and do whatever with it ....

Because somehow that's still a normal and accepted practice in the US.

It seems madness to give your card to someone to take off somewhere. In Australia they either bring you a terminal to touch at the table (for a fancier place), or you touch the terminal on your way out (for a casual place).

In the US an upscale place would never bring a terminal to your table. They give you a check (receipt), you put card or money down, they take it to their register, and bring back a customer receipt or change.

Money is often a taboo subject in the US, and I think that is bleeding into a slow adoption of touchless transactions in nice restaurants.

It will take at least 5 years for this part of US culture to give way to convenience and security.

*Note I've not spent much time on the west coast; I'm sure they're ahead on this

> No need for any special hardware, any special software

Umm, except for the whole Apple device...

You don't need an Apple device.

The same tech used by Apple Pay is directly built into a lot of credit cards.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Contactless_payment

And almost every other smartphone.

>> No need for any special hardware, any special software

ha ha - except for the iphone, watch and apple pay; no special hardware nor software required.

It's just NFC under the hood. Many credit cards have it built into the card itself.

My spouse and I recently went to a TGI Friday's for the first time in like 2 decades. Apparently these types of restaurants (TGIF, Chilli's, Appleby's etc.) now all have a tablet device at the table where you can instantly order another drink, dessert, pay, or (for a price) let the kids play a game. You can use credit cards, and maybe contactless payments (don't remember off the top of my head). It's a neat innovation for a restaurant like that, but of course they make the experience horrible by having this screen at the table constantly showing ads for either other things you can get at the restaurant, or other random things. We usually turn them around so we don't have to see ads while we're trying to eat. But that's a whole other issue.

Portable payment tablets are all over Miami, most accept Apple Pay. Because it’s a tourism hub maybe? Anyway it’s awesome, love not using my cards while traveling. I’m sure it’ll creep across the rest of the country eventually.

Is it possible to use Google Pay to do contact free payments on iPhone?

No, the iPhone NFC is locked down.

When I was in Australia this August, most waiters were "Stunned" that I didn't need a pin to buy things. It doesn't take much to "Stun" a waiter when it comes to tech.

Where in Australia were you?

I ask this because, as an Australian, I pay for essentially every single purchase on Apple Pay. Everyone I know uses mostly their phones to pay.

Everyone I know has been using contactless payments on their credit cards (or visa/mastercard debit cards) for the past 5 years.

No one enters their pins on transactions under $150. Depending on the payment method, that number can be a lot higher.

Yeah, I've lived in Australia all my life and for the past couple of years I've used my phone to pay for everything...even transport[1]. People don't look twice if you use contactless payments

[1] https://transportnsw.info/tickets-opal/opal/contactless-paym...

If it was a tourist spot, it may have been surprising for someone with an American accent not needing a PIN.

to be clear, they were surprised that a chip reader worked WITHOUT a pin. and that I couldn't contactless. Everyone was saying "tap here" when I walked up to pay. "no tap". Pretty much every purchase.

They didn't know all the bells and whistles on their machine. It'd be about as surprising as if I whipped out a personal check and they found their machine had a reader for that.

Which would imply that the waiter is in fact quite savvy since they understand the intricacies of credit card authorisations for different countries.

Not particularly, anyone here who deals with sales for any amount of Americans will quickly see that they're the odd one out with contactless.

It's not that there's heaps of different scenarios, it's that there's America and the rest of the world.

Melbourne: 9 days (near chinatown, the G, The Espy) Sydney: 9 days (Circle Quay, Barangaroo, Blue Mountains) Cairns, Airlie Beach, Yeppoon, Hervey Bay, Brisbane (2-3 days each).

I'm American, my card doesn't do contactless, nor chip and pin. I also used old straight swipe cards while there for fun.

I used cards for most purchases except at the melbourne market and a few other places where cash was required.

Ah. I must have misunderstood your point, that they were stunned at just how anachronistic American payment tech is.

that and that their machine supported it.

This is an odd comment.

We haven't needed a PIN to buy anything like dinner in Australia for close to a decade now. Only exception is if you are going for a more expensive dinner where you might be. But then I doubt your credit card company is overriding that security precaution.

In AU/NZ think the default limit is like $75–$150, depending on the type of shop? With Apple/Google/etc Pay in AU/NZ, the same limit seems to apply as with chips.

Above the limit, with Apple/etc Pay, I usually need to sign and have the card physically on you if the merchant asks for it. I think even my Paywave card requires a signature if used via Google Pay, but a Pin without, but I almost never use that one for large transactions.

Above the limit with Paywave/Chip/etc would make you enter your pin (and you already have the card on you).

If you're paying for expensive things, Apple/Google/etc Pay is a bit worse UX in my experience.

Your comment is unclear, and I can't tell if you're talking about any of the above happening in Australia or elsewhere.

In Australia signatures are not considered a valid form of identification for transactions.

It's PIN or nothing.

That's actually not true either. It depends on the card and the issuer. In particular, contactless Amex cards will occasionally fall back to signature.

Honestly, this runs so counter to the experience that not only I but everyone I know has experienced here, that it almost sounds made-up (though I'm not accusing you of that).

We use contact for everything, with the limit being (for me) $100. Signature is explicitly not allowed any more (overseas cards excepted), with anything over $100 requiring chip + PIN instead. When I say everything, I mean that I don't recall the last time I saw someone use cash to buy a coffee, and the one mate I have who uses cash when he's out at the pub is a unique anomaly to me. Even our public transport systems are (slowly) moving towards augmenting existing NFC transit cards with just allowing you to tap your CC on the reader and charging you a ticket fee directly. I generally don't even bother carrying cash any more, and the biggest payment issue I encounter is whether AmEx is supported (since contactless terminals don't necessarily display that during the payment process).

I would be taken aback if one waiter here was "stunned" by you not needing a PIN to buy things. For "most" to be so beggars belief. As a sibling comment said, the only explanation I can think of is that if you're clearly American due to your accent, then many service staff will be used to Americans being the single different group who can't use contactless and thus prepare to hand over a pen for signature whenever they hear the accent.