Australia's Westpac Bank Announces Upcoming Support for Apple Pay

Westpac, the second largest bank in Australia, has announced plans to implement support for Apple Pay across its brands in 2020, reports The Sydney Morning Herald.

‌Apple Pay‌ is now available for the St. George, BankSA, and Bank of Melbourne brands. Customers of these banks with an eligible Visa debit or credit card can now use ‌Apple Pay‌ for contactless payments and online purchases in Australia.

bankofmelbourne
Westpac customers will have access to ‌Apple Pay‌ by June 2020, and the rollout to the main Westpac brand is said to take longer because Westpac currently uses a different banking platform. As the Westpac system is updated, ‌Apple Pay‌ will be rolling out for its regional brands.

"We want to assure Westpac customers we are working to bring them ‌Apple Pay‌ as quickly as possible, while we roll-out the technology across our different banking platforms," said chief executive of consumer banking David Lindberg.

Westpac has been a notable ‌Apple Pay‌ holdout and is the fourth of Australia's "big four" banks to implement support for ‌Apple Pay‌. Along with NAB and Commonwealth Bank, Westpac attempted to collectively bargain with Apple in an attempt to force Apple to open up the iPhone's NFC capabilities to support other digital wallets, like those offered by Westpac itself.

Apple argued that this would be harmful to consumers and would stifle innovation, and Australian regulators took Apple's side in the dispute. The banks were not provided with authorization to collectively bargain with Apple.

ANZ, one of the four major banks, has supported ‌Apple Pay‌ since it launched in Australia. Commonwealth Bank, Australia's largest bank, has supported ‌Apple Pay‌ since January 2019, and NAB implemented support in May 2019.

Related Roundup: Apple Pay

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Top Rated Comments

joelhinch Avatar
69 months ago
Too late. Bye Westpac.
Score: 3 Votes (Like | Disagree)
kerr Avatar
69 months ago
I hope we soon get news that Myki in Melbourne will support Apple Pay.
Score: 3 Votes (Like | Disagree)
c2104338 Avatar
69 months ago
Westpac? The same bank in the news for 23,000,000 cases of breaching money laundering and counter-terrorism finance laws? Or which failed to investigate customers who made transactions possibly linked to child exploitation in the Philippines and South-East Asia?

Watch the customers come flooding back!
Score: 2 Votes (Like | Disagree)
throAU Avatar
69 months ago

The archaic bank finally decides to jump on board...Pathetic.
Watch them try and spin it as "caring about customers" or whatever now they finally did, like it wasn't a case of them bleeding customers to banks who aren't stuck in the last decade....

:D
Score: 2 Votes (Like | Disagree)
Lozza013 Avatar
69 months ago
Still not available till June 2020? Oh well too little too late for me. Love ING.
Score: 2 Votes (Like | Disagree)
Ralfi Avatar
69 months ago

Watch them try and spin it as "caring about customers" or whatever now they finally did, like it wasn't a case of them bleeding customers to banks who aren't stuck in the last decade....

:D
Watch them market it with their stupid ‘rescue helicopter’ themed commercial...
Score: 2 Votes (Like | Disagree)