Apple Pay Checkout Problems Create Obstacles For Mobile Payment System's Growth

Lift up your phone, tap and pay. That’s how Apple Pay is supposed to work. But for those who have used it in the real world, that hasn’t always been the case.

“Two out of three Apple Pay users have reported a problem at checkout -- mostly related to terminals not working or taking too long to make the transaction, inaccurate posting of transactions and the inability of cashiers to help buyers who needed assistance in using Apple Pay,” said Leon Majors, author of a study by Phoenix Marketing International.

Four months since the launch of Apple Pay, the mobile payment method has come in with an adoption rate of 11 percent of all households with a credit card and 66 percent of iPhone 6 owners. Of those adopters, 59 percent went into a store to make a purchase with Apple Pay. Nearly half visited merchants listed as supporting Apple Pay, but found that they did not accept it or were not ready for it.

Payment terminal trouble was cited as the most commonly encountered problem. That data was gathered from over 3,000 respondents to Phoenix’s survey, of whom 532 were iPhone 6 owners, 350 were Apple Pay adopters and 302 used Apple Pay in the past four months.

Of those that used Apple Pay in the past four months, 48 percent only used it once during that time period.

Despite the apparent problems with Apple Pay, it hasn’t stopped the service from seeing some success, making up for more than every $2 out of $3 spent on contactless payments across Visa, MasterCard and American Express, Apple CEO Tim Cook said in January.