Walmart Pay may surpass Apple in mobile payments

Bloomberg

Wal-Mart Stores Inc.’s app is close to surpassing Apple Pay in usage for mobile payments in the US, giving the world’s largest retailer even more clout as a growing number of people shop with smartphones.
Available in 4,774 stores, Walmart Pay is enrolling tens of thousands of new users a day, up from thousands four or five months ago, said Daniel Eckert, who runs the business. Two-thirds of the customers who try it also use it a second time within 21 days, he said, giving him confidence Walmart Pay will surpass Apple Pay in the US in terms of use by shoppers in stores where they’re accepted.
“If daily enrollments don’t slow down, I think that’s pretty well in the cards shortly,” said Eckert, senior vice president for services and digital acceleration.
“I would have to imagine we are getting pretty close.”
Richard Crone, chief executive officer of researcher Crone Consulting LLC, estimates Walmart will pass Apple Pay in active US users—those making at least two transactions a month—by the end of 2018.
Wal-Mart is the biggest retailer rejecting Apple Pay, which requires merchants to have the right hardware at checkout. Since it rolled out in 2014, Apple has attracted retailers including Best Buy Co, Macy’s Inc and Walgreens Boots Alliance Inc Apple doesn’t track individual consumers’ transactions, which makes some merchants reluctant to use it.
Walmart Pay was unveiled in December 2015, more than a year after Apple’s service debuted. The Bentonville, Arkansas-based retailer resisted the lure of Apple in favour of its own offering—and it’s paid off.
Months after Walmart Pay’s debut, the retailer held discussions with Apple about incorporating Apple Pay into the app, according to people familiar with the matter. The talks continued until March of 2016, ending without a deal due to the difficulty of blending the technology underpinning each company’s approach, said one of the people, who asked not to be identified as the discussions were private.
“As the world’s largest retailer, you can imagine that we have conversations with a variety of companies about products and services that we think would be of interest to our customers, and Apple, as big of a company as they are, is one of those companies,” Wal-Mart said. Apple declined to comment.
Both companies are pursuing a $49 billion market for mobile payments that’s been slow to develop in the US. Many consumers still worry about mobile payments’ security, and find that using a plastic card is often as fast and easy as pulling out their phone to pay. Like many retailers, Wal-Mart still doesn’t accept the wireless payment technology built in to mobile phones, stymieing Apple’s efforts. Instead, Walmart Pay scans a code on the phone to complete a transaction. Wal-Mart has been able to train its associates and customers to use Walmart Pay.