It has just gotten easier for small businesses in the United States to accept contactless payments after two of the country's most popular money platforms confirmed support for Apple's Tap to Pay feature. The feature allows businesses to accept contactless payments via either Apple Pay or contactless cards using nothing more than an iPhone. So long as it's an iPhone XS or newer, no additional hardware is required — no dongles or Bluetooth card readers are needed.
Accepting contactless payments using an iPhone is something that businesses have been doing for years, and the use of contactless payment technology has come on in leaps and bounds thanks in part to the COVID-19 pandemic and a requirement for easy payment methods that do not require cash. Apple announced the Tap to Pay technology in 2022 but it requires that payment processors add support for it before can be used. That's what PayPal and Venmo have now done.
Businesses that want to accept payments via either payment service will simply need to have the required app installed in order to begin accepting payments and tips, process receipts, and more.
An increasingly cashless world
In a press release confirming the support for Apple's Tap to Pay feature, Nitin Prabhu, VP, of Small Business & Financial Services at PayPal noted that people are simply using cash less and less which means businesses need to be able to react.
"As consumers increasingly turn to non-cash options to pay, small businesses are looking for affordable and flexible ways to offer their customers more payment choice without being tied down to a fixed location," Prabhu said. "With Tap to Pay on iPhone, millions of small businesses that use Venmo and PayPal Zettle can now start accepting contactless card and digital wallet payments nearly anywhere, directly on their iPhones, which can expand their customer base and drive incremental sales."
Businesses are already starting to plan with the press release mentioning one in particular that was keen to begin accepting Venmo payments.
"Enabling Tap to Pay on iPhone with our Venmo business profile was really easy, and my customers really love it because it's a quick and convenient way for them to pay," Elaine Bailey, founder of The Cheesecake Queen in Texas, said. "It's especially handy when I have a long line of customers and need to get payments processed quickly. The solution has made it so fast and simple to accept payments when I'm selling at popups and festivals, especially because a lot of my customers don't want to carry cash, and prefer to pay with a digital wallet like Venmo or with cards.
The press release goes on to say that "small business owners can get set up in just a few simple steps and start accepting contactless cards and digital wallets through their Venmo business profile or through PayPal Zettle."
According to PayPal, more than 40% of Americans say that none of the purchases they made within a typical week were made using cash, a move that suggests cash is no longer king for a lot of people. Contactless payments have been relatively slow to take off in the United States while other parts of the world have been using them extensively. Features like Tap to Pay could help give businesses the impetus — and the technology — required to drive adoption across the US.
