It didn’t take long for the effects of Apple’s payment service to be felt by the industry, within a day of the announcement Bloomberg reported Apple is negotiating with US banks to shift transaction fees from merchants.
At the same time Bank Innovation reports the major credit card companies are considering changing the definition of ‘cardholder present’ rules which would make app based purchases cheaper.
The changes Apple Pay is bringing in is part of a wider move to easier, frictionless commerce as Stripe co-founder John Collison discussed on this site last week.
For the banks and credit card companies this means a very different operating environment. What was once a very profitable business is now changing rapidly and profits may not be so easy to come by.