The mobile payment ‘inbetweeners’ - just a part of growing up?
Something has come to my attention this week. It’s the use of a particular payment product that bridges the gap between using multiple cards and the implementation of a fully digital mobile wallet. I know, why would you want one? But stay with me, because I don’t want to dismiss the idea out of hand. After all, if we dismissed some of these ‘new’ ideas then mobile payments or contactless transactions would never have gotten off the ground.
It has to be said, that these in-between steps have been launched in the US. And we know that, at the moment, with the change from magnetic stripe to EMV and mobile payments, there are a lot of alternative wallets looking to get launched in that specific region. So lets look at a couple – Coin and Plastc. First up is Coin, described as a smart card that can replace all of the credit cards and debit cards currently in your wallet. We covered Coin on Contactless Intelligence last year but they have suffered some delays in the shipping of the product so have only just reappeared in our headlights again. Coin is a smart card that looks like a credit card but actually stores the swipe data from as many as eight cards at a time on one device. It receives data from a companion iPhone app and has a small E Ink screen that displays the last four digits of the selected card along with other information such as expiration dates.
A single button on the Coin is used to cycle through the card accounts stored on the device, and optional on-device security is achieved by setting a morse code-like tap pattern that can be set as a requirement before each use. Coin was supposed to be released this past summer after a wildly successful crowdfunding campaign, but the company ran into several problems that delayed its launch. Coin is now set to be released to the public sometime next year, and a small number of users have been given beta versions of the card to test in the meantime.
Journalist Zach Epstein, writing for BGR, field tested the smart card and had this to say, “My favorite thing about Coin so far is its simplicity. Apple Pay will be terrific a few years down the road, but right now it doesn’t work at the majority of retailers in America. For the time being, it’s unnatural and it’s a burden. To use Apple Pay, you have to first remember it exists and then actively seek out a person or a payment terminal to find out if it works at the store you’re in. You also have to learn an entirely new behaviour, and the payoff is diminished by the fact that it barely works anywhere. Coin is a card, and it works just about everywhere credit cards are accepted. There are no extra steps to take and no new behaviors to be learned.” Not surprising then that he gave the card A+ for function.
Similar in design to Coin, Plastc’s product is called the Plastc Card, also a digital credit card sized device with a magnetic strip and a touchscreen E Ink display. The card works with every payment system that supports standard credit cards, and it can store all of your current credit and debit cards on one device. Beyond payments, the Plastc Card’s E Ink display is also dynamic and large enough to display barcodes and QR codes, so it can also store all of your scannable loyalty cards. Wireless charging support helps ensure that it’s easy to refill the device’s 30-day battery, it ships with chip and PIN support, and it connects to your smartphone using Bluetooth Low Energy technology. Plastc says iPhones and Android smartphones will be supported at launch. Also included is Plastc Card’s re-writable NFC/RFID technology that lets Plastc Card mimic any RFID access cards.
Chip and PIN support on the card and facial recognition security features in the companion app is also listed among Plastc’s main benefits, as is the companion app itself, which will also be a one-stop-shop that allows users to check account balances and perform other tasks without the need to open their banks’ apps. Plastc will launch in mid 2015 with seven partner banks including American Express, Bank of America, Chase, Charles Schwab, Citi, US Bank and Wells Fargo.
Both Coin and Plastc are very similar products and have managed to raise a lot of funding. Coin raised $15.5 million in Series A funding after a success crowd funding campaign and Plastc announced at the end of last month that they had raised $5.2 million in Plastc Card’s first week of preorders — given that the card retails at $155, this means the company has sold well over 33,000 units already. The Plastc Card has received a lot of interest in many countries, the company says, including the U.S., Canada, United Kingdom, Australia and Malaysia, suggesting that people are very much interested in smart payment solutions, even if that doesn’t necessarily mean using a smartphone for buying stuff in stores. “The growing worldwide demand for Plastc Card illustrates the real need people have to bridge the physical and digital wallet,” Plastc co-founder and COO Ryan Marquis said. “Our intuition was correct, based on our customers’ feedback and the preorders we have received so far.“
I am not totally convinced about these products myself, but am ready to admit that they may have some role to play along the road to actual mobile wallets - convenience, for one and also there is that ‘wow’ factor to it. While they may incorporate such technology as NFC and BLE, their main saving grace could be the fact that they are impervious to proximity marketing and for some that may be a good thing. I am interested in finding out what our readers think of this form of ‘middle step’ towards mobile payments, so if you have an opinion, please get in touch.
Finally, a reminder - the time for nominations for the CMA 2015 will be drawing to a close soon. Entry is still free and we have a few new categories that you may find your company (or another company, partner, alliance or customer) can fit into. There is nothing to do at the moment other than to go to the nomination page and let us know that you are interested. The entry forms will be sent to you early in the New Year. So good luck and start nominating!
Until next week.
Steve Atkins
Contactless Intelligence
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