I’m trying to move away from Google and other big tech corporations as much as I can without sacrificing practicality but it seems like the only way to make contactless payments is with stock android on a Google approved device.
Is there any alternative out there that would allow me to make contactless payments without these conditions met? (For example, if I put grapheneos on my phone)
Banks in the US often do not provide contactless cards. Contactless payments are only starting to gain some traction since the pandemic… beforehand it was pretty rare, at least on the east coast (I get the sense that other regions of the country were better about this). It is actually madness, though.
Big banks have been contactless is mostly the smaller banks. The bigger reason is for ease of access or reduced wallet size. If you have multiple credit cards or store cards you don’t have to carry them all around with you…
This has not been my experience at all. I’ve had tap for over a decade in Canada, and large banks in the US here did not give me contactless cards a few year ago. In the past couple of years they seem to be rolling out more of them, but people always looked at me like I was a lunatic whenever I tried to tap my Canadian card to pay for something.
Hmm OK I think our timescales are what are mismatched. I got my first tap card 4 years ago.
About four years ago I got a letter from my bank warning me the magnetic stripe on my card can only be used if I travel to certain countries (e.g. the USA). Any attempt to use it domestically will fail as they will assume the card has been cloned. We still have mag scanners at all the stores, for the Americans who visit.
Contactless payment is ubiquitous in most of the world, though often there are limits on the transaction size (those limits seem to be increasing lately).
Yeah, I think we’re mostly in agreement then. I get the sense that some states are ahead in this regard, and I’ve gotten a tap card a few years ago… But it’s still not 100% standard. Not all my cards support contactless payments here, while they all do in Canada (and have for over a decade).
Payment on the east coast has been pretty painful in my experience. I think it’s rapidly gotten better during the pandemic years with more places supporting contactless payments and stuff. It’s pretty common that places won’t accept cards, so you need to carry cash. Contactless payments were pretty rare until they got a big boost post 2020, and restaurants generally won’t split the bill for you (in Canada they’ll just bring the machine to the table and you can pay separately easily). I thought all of America was like this for a while, but it sounds like it might depend on the state.
Well you kept apologizing for it. We Americans aren’t accustomed to that.