“Many retailers have been less than responsive to the Apple Pay mobile payments system. Rather than accept fees that banks charge for making the transactions, Walmart, Best Buy, and others disabled NFC in their stores, preventing customers from using Apple’s system (along with other forms of payment),” Colin Lecher reports for The Verge. “The retailers’ solution is a payment system called ‘CurrentC,’ and it’s an idea that some NFC users aren’t so excited about.”
“CurrentC, a QR code-based app planning to launch next year (meaning reviewers haven’t actually used it in stores yet), appears to be the target of a semi-organized campaign for one-star reviews,” Lecher reports. “As of writing, the reviews breakdown on the App Store looked like this: 17 five-star ratings, zero four-star ratings, three three-star ratings, four two-star ratings, and 2,153 one-star ratings.”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: MCX retailers should learn a lesson from the Market Basket saga post haste.
You do not have the power. The consumer has the power. In many forms. And we will use them all.
[Thanks to MacDailyNews Reader “buddabob” for the heads up.]
Related articles:
Retailer-backed MCX Apple Pay rival has already been hacked; testers’ email addresses stolen – October 29, 2014
Why Walmart, CVS and Rite-Aid really hate Apple Pay: They can’t track your buying habits – October 29, 2014
CurrentC retailers’ conundrum: MCX contract expressly bars Apple Pay acceptance – October 29, 2014
Retailers like CVS and Rite Aid that block Apple Pay are taking a big security risk – October 28, 2014
Apple Pay tussle with CVS, Rite Aid the first shot in mobile payments war – October 28, 2014
In one week, Apple Pay already No. 1; used more than all other mobile payment systems combined – October 28, 2014
Alibaba’s Jack Ma says open to working with Apple on Apple Pay – October 28, 2014
Tim Cook blasts CVS, Rite Aid over Apple Pay blockade: ‘You only are relevant if your customers love you’ – October 28, 2014
Seeking personal data, Walmart, Best Buy, and others won’t let shoppers enjoy Apple Pay privacy – October 27, 2014
Boycott CVS and Rite Aid – October 27, 2014
Bad business: CVS and Rite Aid antagonize their most well-heeled customers by blocking Apple Pay – October 27, 2014
CVS stores reportedly disabling NFC to shut down Apple Pay – October 25, 2014
iPhone users earn significantly more than those who settle for Android phones – October 8, 2014
Yet more proof that Android is for poor people – June 27, 2014
More proof that Android is for poor people – May 13, 2014
Apple’s iOS dominates in richer countries, Android in poorer regions – March 25, 2014
Twitter heat map shows iPhone use by the affluent, Android by the poor – June 20, 2013
iPhone users smarter, richer than Android phone users – August 16, 2011
Yankee Group: Apple iPhone owners shop more, buy more, remain more loyal vs. other device users – July 20, 2010
Consumers. Prepare to have your privacy stolen in 5,4,3,2…..1.
“You are relevant only if your customers love you” — Tim Cook
Exactly which of the CurrentC consortium members can actually say their customers actually love them?
Uh, I’ll give you time to think about it. Take as much time as you need…
If we revolt or if we can revolt against our activity being products, then the CC consortium members will be very sad and MCX will be in trouble.
MCX should try to solve their problem, not by pissing off the people, but by embracing the protocol the people want, and today that is Apple Pay. They embrace it and add value to it through their non-competing ecosystem. I don’t think loyalty programs are incompatible with Apple Pay. MCX is basing their existence on this feature, but is hung up on the financial transaction.
Anyway, No Rite-Aid or CVS until CC members remove their collective heads out of their collective butts.
Don’t confuse who their customers really are!!
Hint: Not the consumer, that’s for sure!
Message to MCX
If you truly believe you have a better system then you have nothing to fear….
Dont force your retailors Into an exclusiveity contract.
Lets see if the consumer will choose your system over Apple.
Blocking other payment systens is a loud cry of fear .. Cry that says no one will choose to use your cumbersom system if they have an option to use another !
MCX the more you drag this bs on the more credibility u lose!
It’s more than a loud cry of fear. It turned MCX into bad guys and Apple into the good guy.
Their worst nightmare.
Even the name is lame .. A bunch of CEO’s in a brainstorming session .. CurrentC = Zune
I don’t know about Zune. These retailers can also decide not to accept any other forms of payment. Most people have smartphones, so they can easily install and use the app. There will be people that will boycott, but some like me have few options. The only grocery store within miles of me is a Publix which, unfortunately, is a CurrentC member.
The fact that many popular retailers are colluding to stifle payment competition is very troubling. Are they colluding on product pricing too? Is that the reason why my groceries are so freaking expense? $8 for bacon, are you fu@#!€ kidding me? And now that they are all tied into the same payment system there probably will be even more product pricing collision. Where is the justice?
I definitely hear you 🙂 … I was just looking at the lame name they came up with LOL!
The ironic thing is, if CVS and RiteAid didn’t publicly disable their NFC function, no one would even know about CurrentC and news of them being hacked would barely register a blip.
Yes but they did and we all heard and soon we will be able to pay at those stores – just a matter of time..
Apple and indeed NFC suppliers generally should produce Apple Pay and/or NFC used here signage for all retailers offering the service. Somehow I doubt that similar signage for QR codes will quite hit the mark with consumers.
Yes, spamming a company by posting reviews of something you have never used based on stuff you read on the Internet about the product is a really great way to go about doing things. It reflects well on you and your brethren.
It’s about sending a message. If enough people make enough noise for a sustained period of time, these companies will have to take notice and do something about the situation.
It’s the “Yes!” Movement Effect.
It is not spaming … It is sending a message as DocW said!
Plus these thugs can easly leave the retailors alone and allow the consumer to choose their prefered system.
If they are blocking me from my prefered choice.. Then i go where my choice is respected and welcomed !
Clear enough MCX?..
U act like a thug u will have unpleasent reaction from the public!
So wait: You’re okay with them putting out an app for a service that isn’t ready yet while they merrily disable functionality that was working in their terminals?
They are able to “review” Pay by disabling it and we’re not able “review” their competing service?
How do YOU know it’s not ready? From reading MDN? Do you really think these spammers actually know what they are talking about, or are they just part of a mindless mob that read something somewhere, got a bug up their asses, had plenty of time to kill during their day of “job searching,” and decided WTH, “why not go on the site and post a negative review about something I don’t know jack shit about?” This is very intelligent behavior.
And just because some idiots are doing the same thing about Apple Pay on the App Store, this somehow makes it acceptable? What is this, kindergarten?
I don’t know about this system and could care less about it. I’m more interested in fair play and adult behavior.
“How do YOU know it’s not ready?”
Research. And not very deep research even.
[emphasis mine]
“Within the last 36 hours, we learned that unauthorized third parties obtained the e-mail addresses of some of our CurrentC pilot program participants and individuals who had expressed interest in the app,” Linda Walsh, a spokeswoman for Merchant Customer Exchange, told ABC News in a statement.
http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/now-currentc-apple-pay-competitor/story?id=26547856
So get off your high horse and act like an adult.
MCX will be eliminated and Walmart will have to take like an adult. Instead of crying about their profit and creating a system that should never have been green lit begin with.
So please detail what you know. Like to know what our members are overlooking.
And MCX just emailed people beta-testing its program that it was hacked and email addresses (at minimum) were stolen. Wow, talk about timing!!!
Do you have a link to an article on this? I haven’t seen it.
See my comment above for the ABC link.
Whenever the reason for something seems just completely out-of-whack with the customers’ priorities, you can be sure money is at the heart of it. If the merchant is choosing CurrentC over ApplePay, it’s motivated purely by their assumption that they will make more money on every transaction, at the expense of the privacy and security of their customers. It’s quite clear that they are willing to risk a security breakdown in the future for the money today. And given how much smarter the hackers and thieves are getting compared to the merchant developed systems, it’s only a matter of time. All we can do is write their corporate offices (which I have done – and received answers, some canned, some not). And we can vote with our wallets who we buy from and how we’ll pay.
I forgot to mention: they are forgetting that they sell merchandise and trust, not transactions.
And they forget that they are asking me to spend MY money at their store ..
Ratailors you want my money … Accommodate my choice.
Or maybe it’s getting all those one star reviews since it doesn’t actually do anything yet. Why release an app months ahead of the network being ready???
No matter.. It is a cumbersome app…. Offers none of the conveniances of the ApplePay !
You should read the comments on the app store. They are rather entertaining.
If I got to the checkout in a shop here in the UK with a terminal for cashless payment, tried it and the cashier told me they won’t accept my money via my phone, but I could stand there, download their app, scan their QR code, wait for it to approve, and by the way, here’s an offer for using it, I’d tell them to get lost, saying, as we do over here, “you’re having a laugh, aren’t you? Waste my time using some piss-pot camera tech to buy stuff? I’m out of here!”
http://wh.gov/icBmj