About 95 percent of the coffee shops and stores I frequent in the Phoenix area use a Square reader or terminal to process payments, and virtually none of them support Apple Pay. That could soon change, though, thanks to a new contactless payments terminal from Square that will bring Apple Pay to businesses small and large this fall.
During today’s WWDC keynote, Apple revealed that Square’s new contactless chip reader will move customers through lines quicker than ever with NFC support for Apple Pay and Android Pay, as well as taking chip-and-pin cards.
To pay, customers simply tap their iPhone or Apple Watch on the device. If you’ve got a chip and pin card, you just slide the card into the slot until the transaction is completed. Merchants can plug the new reader into the Square Stand USB hub or use the reader’s battery to connect it wirelessly.
Reservations to receive the new reader opened this morning, and the company says it will send out 250,000 free units of the new NFC reader. Pricing hasn’t been announced as of yet, but Square says it’ll also throw in its regular magnetic stripe reader with every box, in case customers aren’t ready to embrace the 21st century just yet.
Source: Square
Buster Hein is a freelance writer who lives in Phoenix, Arizona. Twitter: @bst3r.
8 responses to “Square’s new card reader will bring Apple Pay to everyone”
Checkmate by Square. This would totally help Apple Pay adoption since MOST small businesses will now accept Apple Pay! Cant wait for this.
Am I the only one confused? I click the correct “free” (applepay) link on the square site, and then it says “$49”.
“Non-qualified sellers may be eligible to purchase the item for $49, and receive $49 in reimbursed processing fees. Square reserves the right to modify or cancel the offer at any time.”
Thanks Amar, but where did you see that? I’d like to figure what makes me a “nonqualified seller”, if that’s the case.
Written on the bottom of that same page
I went from homepage all the way to billing info, 3x. None of the pages I clicked through had that info.
I went from homepage all the way to billing info, 3x. None of the pages I clicked through had that info.
Found it. You CANNOT hit the “reserve free” button on the main page. You have to hit “learn more”, THEN hit “reserve free” on THAT page. Still no explanation what apparently makes me “non-qualified” though.