New Samsung Phones May Let Your Use Your Credit Cards Everywhere

There is no question that mobile phones will be the future (at least near future) of handling credit cards for payment purposes. While Apple Pay is the more popular electronic payment method at this time (and pretty secure), they were certainly not the first. Other companies like Coin, LoopPay, even Google’s own Wallet have all been around for a bit but never created the type of acceptance amongst retailers, manufacturers, and consumers as Apple Pay.

Samsung Buys LoopPay For Mobile Payments

However, that could change. While Apple Pay relies on terminals being advanced enough to handle NFC or Apple Pay payments, LoopPay was actually created last year (see my post here) as a way to utilize existing credit card terminal processing by simply allowing you to hold a LoopPay equipped phone or fob (the equipped phone had to be in a special case) to the terminal and a magnetized field would be created to allow the payment to process. At the time (last summer), LoopPay said that 90% of US terminals were able to accept it.

Except that you had to insert your phone in the carrying case to use LoopPay. Until now. Samsung has purchased LoopPay and will undoubtedley be folding the LoopPay system into future phones so that payments can be made without any special accessory. There had been talk for a while of a partnership between the two but it was announced last week that Samsung bought LoopPay.

The New LoopPay System Could Be On The New Galaxy S6

The interesting part is that the reveal of the Samsung Galaxy S6 will be unveiled March 1st and strong rumors say that it will be equipped with the LoopPay facility to handle mobile payments. That will be huge for Samsung fans as it should be usable at most terminals across the country and not just the updated ones. This is huge for credit card point aficionados as we can carry all of our point-earning cards “in” the phone and you can “pull” out whatever card you need for various programs. Are you out and you forgot to grab that Amex card with the saved Amex Offer? No problem – pull it up on your phone and use it. It should be instantly more usable than Apple Pay given that you can use it almost anywhere, according to LoopPay.

Samsung fans, if the S6 does have this capability, would that be enough to make you upgrade?

HT: Engadget