Dunno how you can say that apple pay is this mecca of innovation. or that its successful. It only just came out, the jury is still in on whether or not its successful.
So far, at my business, not a single person has tried to use apple pay. Our terminals support NFC.
As a small business owner, i just want something that erases credit card fees. Apple pay does NOTHING for me. I still get charged for every swipe of the credit card. Or in this case i get charged for a swipe of the phone(which on the back end is no different then if you had pulled our your credit card and swiped it)
All apple pay does is give apple a piece of the pie. Sure they say they dont charge you additional fees, and they get their money from the banks processing their transactions. However, if people start using it, and lots of transactions go through apple pay. credit card processing fees will increase, the apple profit will just be passed on to small businesses.
A credit card swipe costs the credit card companies virtually nothing, a tiny fraction of a tiny fraction of a tiny fraction of a penny to process that transaction. Yet they charge 25-30cents or so on each swipe, and they charge a percentage of the gross sale 1-2%. If your card is declined and the retailer swipes it again, they get charged another swipe fee. Even if its declined again. Hell swipe your card on a small sale, say a $1-2, and ive likely lost money selling you that item because of the swipe fee.
1-2% Sounds small but take a $10 item. Credit card fee will be 45 cents or so. Ends up being 4.5% ish of that $10. But wait thats not the real percentage either. Costs $7 to buy the item. So really you made $3 before the credit card fees. Now the credit card has eaten up 15% of the profit on that item, leaving you with 2.55. But wait thers more, one still needs to count employee wages, utilities, rent, taxes, etc. Makes the credit card fees even larger compared to the profit.
But wait thats not all either. Dont forget the 25% interst they charge the consumer as well. And those $35 over the limit fees for every sale. Dont forget the reorderign of charges so largest charges are processed first so you get dinged for $35 10 time sin a row for 10 $1 sales. (ive seen this happen to friends, one guy had 15 charges from redbox a few years ago, where the credit card had tacked on a $35 over the limit fee on every single one.)