Big bank drops in on pay wave

Options for paying by phone continue to grow, as Sophie Elsworth reveals in this exclusive report

MILLIONS more Australians can tap and pay at the checkout using their smartphone or wearable after one of the nation’s biggest banks revealed it is rolling out Samsung Pay today.

Consumers continue to ditch debit or credit cards and instead pay with their device via a digital wallet in their phone.

Now smartphone giant Samsung has joined forces with National Australia Bank to offer another payment solution.

It is the last of the big four banks to roll out Samsung Pay, giving customers with compatible devices, including Galaxy S9 and S9+ phones, and wearables such as Gear3 and Gear2 another option to pay.

Samsung now has more than 45 financial institutions offering Samsung Pay.

As for rival Apple Pay, ANZ remains the only of the big four banks to offer this payment solution – but other larger institutions including ING and Bendigo Bank also provide it for customers.

Samsung Electronics Australia’s head of product and services Mark Hodgson said the adoption of Samsung Pay by another big four bank was a win for consumers.

“We are trying to reduce the reliance on the wallet. It’s a very easy to use solution, you can literally swipe up and authenticate before you make payments,’’ he said.

“We have a number of security features there to make it a very secure payments system.”

He said consumers liked the handiness of being able to pay with a device, particularly in situations where they had accidentally left their wallet at home.

NAB’s executive general manager of consumer lending Angus Gilfillan said he was “seeing 20 per cent growth in the number of customers using mobile payments every three months”.

“The biggest users are in the mornings in petrol stations and in the evening transactions through supermarkets,’’ he said.

NAB already offers customers NAB Pay, which enables customers to make “tap and go” purchases on Android devices at the checkout.

In addition to this, the bank offers Fitbit and Garmin Pay for the sporty customers using wearable devices, like watches.

NAB data revealed consumers using NAB Pay are spending on average $29.70 and most likely to be spending at supermarkets, followed by restaurants, fast food venues and hardware giant Bunnings.