The launch of Apple Pay was met with resistance by retailers hoping to kill the new payments solution, but after just one week of waging a war on Apple Pay, MCX is already starting to see its death grip on CurrentC supporters begin to weaken.
Meijer, a popular supermarket chain in the Midwest, says it has no plans to stop accepting Apple Pay at its 213 stores, even though its a member of the MCX consortium backed by Walmart, Target, BestBuy, Gap, and over 50 other stores that want to replace your wallet the unlaunched CurrentC service.
In an interview with Michigan Live, Meijer spokesman Frank Gugielmi confirmed that the company supports both Apple Pay and other solutions, despite reports that MCX members receive steep fines for accepting anything other than CurrentC.
“We have had the technology in our stores to accept mobile wallets for several years now. If a customer has Apple Pay capability, our hardware works with it. We don’t plan to remove or disable these systems.”
Meijer’s move to keep Apple Pay enabled comes days after CVS and Rite Aid both disabled Apple Pay on their payment terminals. The retailers’ war on Apple Pay sparked a boycott supported by both iOS and Android fans alike that MCX has tried to squash by assuring users their data is safe in the cloud – even though MCX was recently hacked.
MCX COO Scott Rankin told Recode that using Apple Pay would not disqualify Meijer from CurrentC, but he didn’t specify whether they would face some type of penalty.
“I think if they want to go forward and continue to accept Apple Pay, down the road at some point if they want to be a customer of MCX and roll out CurrentC and offer it to customers that’s great.“In the future I think there will be multiple platforms available not just at MCX merchants but everywhere.”
Rankin admitted that the MCX is banning Apple Pay to help CurrentC get a head start, but the QR-based wallet/loyalty program isn’t expected to launch until 2015. Apple Pay is already available at over 220,000 stores in the U.S., and retailers don’t even have to join a league of super-mega evil stores to use it.
Buster Hein is a freelance writer who lives in Phoenix, Arizona. Twitter: @bst3r.
18 responses to “CurrentC’s death grip on partners is starting to slip”
Maybe we’ll see Rite Aid and CVS reverse course.
CurrentC is lame. It’s already been hacked…
Yep and it is disconcerting how biase they have been about it. It’s just emails they say. Well that’s a gateway to getting more with all the idiots that fall for phishing every month. Plus emails are often the log in ID for systems and now someone has a list of highly possible emails to try over the next few months
This is so stupid. Apple pay is super easy to use, but leave it to idiots to want to have a difficult way to make a payment at a store and hold up lines.
No, CMX is trying to bypass the credit card companies and wants direct access to your checking account! And they want to track you as a consumer as well!
Direct access, with none of the usual fraud protections. No thank you! Apple Pay is leagues better!
Uuummm anti-competitive practices maybe?
Please write to customer service at CVS, Rite Aid, and especially Walmart and Best Buy and complain. It’s not appropriate for the latter two to sell the iPhone 6 and then not let its buyers use its important fingerprint authentication security features.
This is a clear breach of the anti trust laws. FFS, the product isn’t even operational. Asses.
not sure about how clear the anti trust is but consumer privacy and protection questions abound
This is crazy! If you, like me, want to boycott these stores and need a list or just want to contact them with your frustrations… You can do so here: http://boycott-mcx.com
I tried to use Apple Pay at Meijer 5 days ago and it wouldn’t work. Hmm…
CurrentC is anti-competition and effectively a League of Evil. Harder to use, limited in funding choices, less secure… why would anyone WANT to use CurrentC?!
Yes, let’s see how this ends! Idiots.
Fcktrds.
With all the bad press that Rite Aid and CVS got and MCX saying folks won’t be fined etc why wouldn’t they. I mean yeah they might get booted out of MCX and lose their half million entry fee but in the end with CurrentC not yet running and the recent hack they might make well over half a million supporting Apple Pay and other NFC.
CurrentC will get access to my checking account when they pry it from my cold dead fingers!
As a Canadian I don’t get to use Apple Pay at home but as I live on the border with Michigan, where Meijer stores are plentiful, I got to try it out and it worked great. CurrentC can honk on bobo for all I care as it’s an OBVIOUSLY inferior system.