We agree with Apple – NFC isn’t necessary… Even for payments.
With the release of the much anticipated iPhone 5, Apple announced the exclusion of Near Field Communication (NFC) technology stating that the technology just doesn’t solve any real problems for users. We agree. NFC is cool technology even if it has been around for 20 years, but the problem is that most merchants don’t have NFC readers (only 1%) and only a tiny percent of phones (less than 5%) have the feature support.
While some press outlets like ‘All Things Digital’ and ‘GigaOm’ indicate that if Apple had included the technology, it would have given a boost to mobile payments, the FreedomPay Mobile platform works flawlessly without NFC technology. FreedomPay Mobile lets iPhone 5 users pay with their mobile phones today.
Besides, having the phones in place is only half the battle. Merchants would need to update terminals at great expense and analysts say that could take five, seven or even ten years. FreedomPay Mobile lets merchants accept mobile payments today without purchasing new hardware and works with all Androids and iPhones.
Leaving NFC off the iPhone 5 was the right move for Apple’s customers since with FreedomPay Mobile customers can get the best of both worlds – a slim phone and secure mobile payments.
The FreedomPay Mobile app is available as a white labelled platform for merchants.