Apple Pay Bank Support Continues to Grow

Apple Pay launched earlier this week alongside the iOS 8.1 update for iPhone and iPad users. The new payment platform already has a handful of banks that support it, as well as a growing list of retail stores. However, one big roadblock has been bank support, with only a few big-name banks supporting Apple’s digital wallet service, but that’s quickly changing.

Visa has announced that over “the coming weeks,” Apple Pay will begin to support a ton of smaller regional banks, and the company provided a really long list of these banks that Apple Pay would soon support. Frankly, the list is way too long to list every single bank, but find your bank on the list to see if you’re one of the lucky ones.

As for MasterCard, it also provided a list of banks that will be getting Apple Pay support soon, although this list is a bit shorter, but it says that Fifth Third, First Hawaiian, First National Bank of Omaha, First Niagara, Key Bank, Silicon Valley Bank, SSFCU, SunTrust and Synchrony Financial are among the banks that will support Apple Pay in the near future.

Currently, only a handful of major banks support Apple Pay, and they include Bank of America, Capital One, Chase, Citi and Wells Fargo. Apple says that more banks will be coming soon, though, including Barclay, Navy Federal, PNC, USAA and US Bank, as well as around 500 other smaller banks.

Apple Pay is essentially the company’s own digital wallet platform to take on the growing market of digital payment systems that already released by companies like Google.

Apple Pay allows you to store your credit card information on your iPhone and use it to buy stuff at any store that supports Apple Pay. The iPhone 6 has an NFC chip that allows you to tap the pay terminal at a store to instantly buy goods. Furthermore, doing this doesn’t give the store your credit card information, so you’re less susceptible to store hacks that steal credit card information, similar to the recent Home Depot and Target hacks.

Apple Pay also works with mobile shopping apps, allowing you to pay with a single touch of the Touch ID fingerprint sensor in shopping apps that support the feature.

Furthermore, Apple says that 220,000 store locations accept Apple Pay as a payment method, and that number will no doubt continue to grow into 2015 and beyond.

The company lists a handful of national chains that support Apple Pay, including McDonald’s, Panera Bread, Staples, Walgreens, Subway, Whole Foods, Macy’s, Bloomingdales, and the Disney Store.

As for apps that accept one-touch payment with Apple Pay, there are plenty that are already on board with it. Some notable shopping apps include Groupon, Panera Bread, OpenTable, Starbucks, Sephora, Target, and even Uber.

MLB.com is another entity that supports Apple Pay, which isn’t too surprising considering that the MLB has had a close relationship with Apple recently, as the league worked closely with the Cupertino-based company to launch iBeacon in MLB stadiums across the country earlier this year. Plus, AT&T Park and Kauffman Stadium are the first stadiums to begin accepting Apple Pay, which spectators can use now during the World Series.

Of course, the new payment platform hasn’t launched without its issues. Many users reported being charged twice for one transaction, while other people claimed that they had trouble getting Apple Pay to work in the first place. We reckon Apple, banks and stores will work together to fix these issues, but for now it seems early adopters aren’t having a fantastic time with it.

And with the holiday shopping season quickly approaching, we wouldn’t be surprised to see Apple Pay grow over the next couple of months.