Apple CEO Tim Cook has said “2015 will be the year of Apple Pay,” but he may need to tell that to retailers.
In a new survey, two-thirds of Apple Pay users said they’ve had trouble using the service at the checkout counter. The report by Phoenix Marketing International found sales opportunities to eager consumers are being wasted.
Almost half of the 3,000 survey respondents, all iPhone 6 or iPhone 6 Plus users, said they had visited a store that was listed as accepting Apple Pay, but when they got there found out it either did not accept it or was not technologically ready to do so.
Even when Apple Pay worked, there were numerous complaints of transactions taking too long, recording inaccurate amounts and untrained clerks unable to provide help, the report said. That’s causing many potential Apple Pay users to stop bothering; 48 percent used the service only once.
“The early-on transaction potential is being undercut by low repeat usage and lost payment opportunities,” Greg Weed, Phoenix’s director of card research said in the report. “The demand is there . . . but so is the disappointment.”
Some of the problems are likely growing pains for a new technology. “Apple Pay is still in an introductory mode and the NFC acceptance network still has a long way to go,” Weed said in the report.
Still, a quarter of those surveyed expected to use Apple Pay significantly more over the next three months. That’s encouraging news for banks and businesses, which are expected to benefit from $67 billion in mobile-payment sales this year.
At top: Apple senior VP Eddy Cue demonstrates the Apple Pay mobile payment system in 2014. (AP Photo/Eric Risberg, File)
