Financial services firm Square is to offer its UK sellers ‘buy now pay later’ (BNPL) capability across their platforms.

Sellers will be able to offer customers BNPL online through a Clearpay integration at the checkout, while any in-person Square checkouts will also support Clearpay options, including Square Point of Sale, Square for Retail and Square for Restaurants.

The move makes the UK the only market in which all Square platforms offer BNPL solutions.

Clearpay, known as Afterpay outside the UK and EU, was acquired by Square in 2021 for approximately $29 billion. Square registered a 180% global increase in new customers using Afterpay through Square sellers between February and March, and US businesses that offered it as a BNPL service saw increases such as a 17% increase in clothing sales.

The integration means Customers can complete payments in four interest-free instalments over a six week period, while sellers receive the full amount up-front. Clearpay integration will also be available for developers within the Square Web Payments SDK, offering businesses the option to maintain Square and Clearpay payments easily.

Clearpay will also be available as a payment method for sellers who utilise Square’s Virtual Terminal dashboard, through which customers can be sent Pay Links via text message.

Square offers businesses hardware and software to facilitate card payments, with dedicated Square Readers and Stands, or even through a simple iOS or Android app. As its customer base is primarily made up of businesses that did not formerly have card payment capabilities, 96% of Square Sellers are small and medium-sized businesses (SMBs), according to market insight firm Enlyft.

BNPL payments accounted for almost £13 billion of UK e-commerce spending in 2021, and could exceed £16 billion in 2022, according to US fintech giant FIS. In the UK, BNPL is expected to account for 12% of UK e-commerce spending by 2025, and is currently the fastest growing online payment method.

Rich Bayer, UK country manager at Clearpay, identified “young and engaged shoppers who want BNPL as their preferred payment method” as a key market that the integration opens up to Square Sellers.

With the worsening cost of living crisis and rising inflation, SMBs are increasingly look for ways to offset costs for their customers, as even smaller purchases begin to be weighed up against the price tag of essential items.

“We’re thrilled to be integrating Clearpay both in-store and online in the UK,” stated Alyssa Henry, head of Square. "The integration across platforms furthers our goal to give sellers of all sizes omnichannel tools that help them to grow by meeting consumer shopping habits, whatever and wherever they are.

“Clearpay provides our ecosystem with a new tool beyond an alternative payment method; it enables an omnichannel commerce solution that can offer true value to our sellers.”

For the past decade, we’ve been assured that biometric security is the future, and that soon we’ll be able to do away with traditional forms of identification and authentication in favour of using our faces, fingerprints and even voices.

However, while biometric technology is certainly more common than it was in 2010, the promised revolution hasn’t quite materialised. We still have to rely on PINs and passwords for many of our transactions (both financial and otherwise) and biometric authentication is still largely limited to mobile devices. So what’s next for the technology? In this episode, we talk to Steven Furnell, senior IEEE member and professor of cyber security at the University of Nottingham, about where biometric security is going.

Footnotes

• What are biometrics?
• Only skin deep: The state of biometric security
• Petition urges EU regulators to ban biometric mass surveillance
• Hacked for life: Why you should be terrified by biometric technology
• TikTok settles for $92m after being accused of harvesting biometric data
• Dreaming of a world without passwords
• GitHub now supports security keys in a move away from passwords
• Google’s about to push everyone into two-factor authentication
• The IT Pro Podcast: How hackers steal your password
• If not passwords then what?
• The pros and cons of facial recognition technology
• How can facial recognition be made safer?
• Facial recognition tech used by UK police "breaches privacy"
• The IT Pro Podcast: The psychology of security

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Apple Pay is Apple's contactless payment solution. Here, we'll breakdown what is, how you use it, and the latest news on the serivce.

Latest news

12/04/2017: Apple Pay is being used by 86 million people, almost doubling its take-up in the last 12 months, according to Juniper Research. It makes the contactless payment technology the favourite by far, with the second most popular service, Samsung Pay, being used by 34 million people and Android Pay by 24 million.

Juniper predicts the number of people using mobile contactless payments will reach 10 million in the next few months, surpassing 150 million by the end of the year.

In total, the three mobile payment options increased their market share of the contactless market to 41% in 2016, compared to just 20% back in 2015. Juniper thinks this will increase to 56% by 2021.

However, major payment providers such as PayPal threaten Apple's position, with analysts predicting they have the infrastructure to launch a similar payment option much faster than mobile developers.

But it's not all bad news, because Juniper Research noted that mobile contactless payments will continue to gain traction across the world and has the potential to take over from the use of contactless debit cards, for example.

"We believe that as contactless usage gains traction and consumers/merchants recognise the speed and convenience it offers, then, as in European markets, there will be a further and significant increase in availability at the point-of-sale," the report's research author, Nitin Bhas, said.

Apple has already revealed retailers are fully supportive of its contactless solution, with 35% of retailers accepting it at the end of 2016, compared to just 4% in 2014.

14/07/2016: European consumers are keen to use biometrics when paying for goods, according to a new survey. The news gives a boost to payment services such as Apple Pay, which relies on biometrics for increased security.

In a survey of over 14,000 European consumers by Visa, two-thirds want to use biometrics when making payments and nearly three-quarters (73 per cent) see two-factor authentication, where a biometric is used in conjunction with a payment device, as a secure way to confirm an account holder.

The study found that online retailers have the most opportunity for gain as nearly a third (31 per cent) of people have abandoned a browser-based purchase because of the payment security process.

But Jonathan Vaux, executive director of Innovation Partnerships at Visa Europe said that one of the challenges for biometrics is scenarios in which it is the only form of authentication.

"It could result in a false positive or false negative because, unlike a PIN which is entered either correctly or incorrectly, biometrics are not a binary measurement but are based on the probability of a match," he said.

Vaux added that biometrics work best when linked to other factors, such as the device, geolocation technologies or with an additional authentication method.

27/05/2016:Apple wants to expand Apple Pay to more countries worldwide, reports TechCrunch, focusing particularly on Asia and Europe.

Jennifer Bailey, VP of Apple Pay, said: "We're working rapidly in Asia and also in Europe, our goal is to have Apple Pay in every significant market Apple is in.

"We have announced Hong Kong [and], across the [Asia Pacific] region, we're talking to many partners and banks and evaluating how quickly we can bring Apple Pay to new markets."

The service was recently expanded within Singapore, and now supports five of the country's major banks and 80 per cent of cards after launching in April. Apple Pay is also used in the US, Canada, the UK, Australia and China.

Possible locations for the service to move into this year include France, Hong Kong, Brazil and India.

"First, we look at the size of the market for Apple products," Bailey continued. "We also look at credit and debit card penetration, and [existing] contactless payment coverage.

"[But] when we bring Apple Pay to market even when contactless is low it will grow - it was 4 per cent in the US and is now 20 per cent. We also work with our network partners, where we can utilise integration with Amex and Visa, to go to market quickly."

16/05/2016: The CEO of the DVLA has hinted that driving licences may be added to Apple Pay in the future. Oliver Moreley posted a picture of a UK driving licence displayed on an iPhone within the Apple Wallet app, with the caption "So here's a little prototype of something we're working on#drivinglicence," from his Twitter account.

The picture showed what looks like a slightly tweaked version of a current photo driving licence, showing the driver's name, date of birth, issue and expiry date, alongside their picture.

Not only does it demonstrate the scope of the Wallet app - covering everything you would normally find in a physical wallet, including loyalty cards, payment cards and identification, it also shows how the government is being expected to adapt by digitising many of its services.

However, there are lots of challenges the DVLA needs to overcome before digital driving licences will become mainstream, such as verifying the identification is genuine rather than a stolen identity or a fake and preventing identity theft.

Last month, it announced the phasing out of paper driving licences, meaning drivers are only expected to present their photocard when asked for proof of ID and right to drive by the police.

05/04/2016: Barclays and Barclaycard have confirmed that customers can now use Apple Pay, almost nine months after the the service was introduced.

Barclays customers can now make payments using an iPhone, iPad, or Apple Watch at more than 400,000 locations in the UK, including London's transport network, if they have the app.

The bank had delayed adopting Apple Pay as it promoted its own contactless payment solution, and now becomes one of the last UK banks to endorse Apple Pay.

This announcement has prompted suggestions that Barclays will also support Android Pay when Google's own contactless payments tool launches this summer, but Barclays has not given any confirmation of this.

Barclays joins a fleet of UK banks supporting Apple Pay, which include Bank of Scotland, First Direct, Halifax, Lloyds Bank, M&S Bank, MBNA, Nationwide, NatWest, Royal Bank of Scotland, Santander, Tesco Bank, TSB and Ulster Bank.

29/03/2016:Apple will launch a browser version of its mobile payment service, Apple Pay, later this year, according to reports.

The new service will be available on Apple's Safari browser on iPhone or iPad models with TouchID fingerprint technology, reports Re/code, before possibly becoming available on Macs in the future.

An announcement of the expansion is expected at WWDC, Apple's developer conference that ordinarily takes place in June, but nothing has yet been confirmed. If it does go ahead, the move puts Apple in direct competition with PayPal.

26/02/2016:Apple Watch and iPhone users will be able to use the London Underground for free for the next three Mondays if they have a MasterCard account linked to Apple Pay.

Eligible users can thentouch in and out with their iOS device at any time on Monday 29 February, Monday 7 March and Monday 14 March.

Travellers can use the Tube, Overground, Bus, TfL Rail and river boat services up to a value of 28.10, which will then be refunded to the user's MasterCard account within 28 days.

05/02/2016: Barclays has announced it will adopt Apple Pay, meaning the bank's customers will be able to use the service soon. Although Barclays didn't offer up an actual release date for the service, the company's CEO said it will become available for customers to use between 26 March and 10 April.

A Barclays executive sowed the seed of speculation, responding to a customer who asked when the service will launch at the bank, confirming via email it will be offered "in the next 60 to 75 days."

Barclays is one of the last banks to support Apple's mobile payment solution, which is surprising considering it's the second biggest bank (in terms of assets) in the UK behind HSBC.

28/01/2016: Transport for London (TfL) has seen a surge in commuters paying for journeys with their mobile devices in the months since Apple Pay launched.

Its latest statistics show that more than 35,000 people a day now tap in and out of the tube using their mobile devices, and credited Apple Pay, which launched in the UK last July, for the growth.

"The launch of Apple Pay in the UK saw the number of mobile transactions increase sharply," its Commissioner's Report for February 2016 read.

"Apple Pay's launch in July saw a flurry of new mobile devices used on our system, followed by later spikes as issuing banks were added to the Apple Pay system."

In total, 3.2 million commuters used their mobile devices to pay for journeys in the second half of 2015, TfL said.

21/12/2015: Apple has secured a deal to bring its Apple Pay mobile payments service to China. The service willroll out to China UnionPay cardholders in early 2016.

"China is an extremely important market for Apple, and with China UnionPay and support from 15 of China's leading banks, users will soon have a convenient, private and secure payment experience," Apple's head of internet software and servicesEddy Cue said.

The move is important for Apple as the country is responsible for around 25 per cent of its total revenue and a lot of its growth over the last few years.

In November 2014, Apple and UnionPay struck a deal to allow the bank's cardholders to pay for digital goods on Apple's App Store.

Apple Pay will work on UnionPay's recently-launched contactless payment service Quick Pass. The Quick Pass digital wallet supports cards from 20 Chinese banks.

The Apple service will compete against rivals Alipay and WeChat in China. Financial terms of the deal were undisclosed.

22/11/2015:Apple and Mastercard are allowing people using the two to get free travel on the London Underground for the next three Mondays until Christmas.

Customers just need to touch in and touch out using their Apple iPhones or Apple Watches on London Buses, London Underground, London Trams, Docklands Light Railway, London Overground, TfL Rail, Emirates Air Line, and most National Railin the capital.

The money spent will take up to 28 days to be refunded and Mastercard will repay users up to 27.90 for each day's travel.

17/11/2015:TSB and Tesco Bank have joined the Apple Pay program meaning all but one of the major UK banks now support the payments platform. Customers having problems registering their cards should consultTSBandTesco Banksupport pages for further information. TSB is offer five per cent cashback on the first 100 spending each month.

Barclays still hasn't joined, but its current guidance is that it will be available "early in the new year.

12/10/2015:Barclays customers will finally be able to use Apple Pay, it has been confirmed ... but not until 2016.

Customer Mike Jobson went all the way to the top to find out why one of the country's largest banks isn't yet offering the service, emailing the CEO of Barclays Retail Banking in the UK, Ashok Vaswani.

"I am writing to you to complain about the complete lack of attention and care you have paid to your customers over the Apple Pay situation you seem to be ignoring," said Jobson.

"You only have to look at comments on your social media output to see that most customers want Apple Pay and are prepared to switch banks for it. Why don't you just get on the Apple Pay train before you get left behind?" he added.

It seems the terse email has paid off. While the official line until now has been that Barclays "will make an announcement on timing in due course", Vaswani told Jobson: "We have signed up for ApplePay (sic) and will launch it very early in the New Year. We truly value your custom and hope that you continue to bank with us particularly since we are launching this shortly."

How early is very early? Customers like Jobson would surely hope the first half of January, but experience tells IT Pro it can translate to Q1. Either way, Barclays customers will, as Jobson said: "have to sit it our for a few (many?) months or switch banks".

14/09/2015: Apple Pay can now be used by customers of Lloyds Bank, Halifax, and Bank of Scotland, as the trio today announced their support for the payments platform two months after its UK release date of 14 July.

Other banks including HSBC and First Direct already support Apple Pay, as well as NatWest, Nationwide, and Santander.

But notable absentees include Barclays, which has launched its own rival payments platform for customers.

The transaction limit for the contactless payment system is now 30, up from 20, after the government introduced the higher spending barrier at the start of September.

Users can pay for goods and services in around 250,000 UK shops, including Boots and Waitrose.

07/09/2015: Apple looks set to bolster the number of mobile wallets using contactless payments to 200 million by the end of 2016, up 100 per cent from 2014, according to a study by Juniper Research.

The analyst outfit said that while historically growth has been driven by P2P (Person to Person) services for those without bank accounts in developing markets, the launch of Apple Pay has "prompted a hive of activity in the contactless arena".

It argued that with public awareness of contactless heightened in the wake of Apple's launch, competing services such as Samsung Pay and the forthcoming Android Pay would no longer need to seed the market.

The research found that a number of banks were partnering with Visa or MasterCard to implement own-brand contactless wallets using a cloud-based secure element.

The analyst firm said that the MCX (Merchant Customer Exchange) Consortium had postponed the launch of its own contactless service, with several retailer partners now abandoning their closed shop' stance towards Apple Pay. It added that the consortium has not agreed terms with any leading card holders, citing the high transaction fees as a stumbling block.

"By the time MCX launches, US consumers will have a choice of perhaps half a dozen other mobile wallet solutions, not to mention the fact that an increasing number will also have contactless payment cards. In addition, the reliance on store brand payment cards could ultimately be a fatal flaw for the service," said Dr. Windsor Holden, author o Juniper's Mobile Wallets - The Future of Cash whitepaper.

The research also found that wallets run by mobile operator consortia continue to fare badly, with the UK's Weve dropping its planned wallet, and Softcard folding in the US.

28/07/2015: HSBC and First Direct have finally launched support for Apple Pay in the UK. Both banks will allow debit and credit card holders to pay for travel on London Underground, Starbucks and other retailers supporting Apple Pay.

HSBC was supposed to be a launch partner for the payment technology, but was late to the party because of an unspecified "technical error". The bank accidentally tweeted the launch date of Apple Pay before it was officially announced.

Royal Bank of Scotland, Halifax, Lloyds, M&S Bank and TSB Bank are still listed as "coming soon" on Apple Pay's UK website.

Tube passengers using Apple Pay face penalty fares if their iPhone or Apple Watch runs out of battery, warned Transport for London (TfL).

Anyone using Apple's mobile payment app to travel on the underground, trains and buses must ensure their device has enough charge to show ticket inspectors they have paid for their journey, said TfL.

The transport operator has accepted Apple Pay as a contactless payment method since its launch on 14 July, but told passengers they would be charged the maximum fare if their device dies in the middle of a journey, meaning they cannot use it to touch out' at the end.

If ticket inspectors cannot read dead iPhones or Apple Watches on their readers, passengers will be forced to pay penalty fares, TfL added.

A page on TfL's website read: "Your iPhone or Apple Watch must be switched on to use it to travel. You should also check that you have enough battery on your iPhone or Apple Watch to complete your journey."

People must also stick to either their iPhone or Apple Watch when tapping in and out with Pay, as TfL's ticket barriers will not register one journey using multiple devices.

The problem is a result of Apple Pay's security measure to stop card details being stolen - instead of releasing card details to a payee when a transaction occurs, Pay issues a unique ID for each separate transaction.

That means it would issue one for an iPhone, and a separate one for an Apple Watch, even if they were both used on the same journey.

TfL added: "If you keep a contactless payment or Oyster card in your phone case, you should remove it before using your iPhone to touch in and out. If you don't, you could pay for your travel with a card you did not intend to pay with."

Reports of Apple Pay users getting into trouble on the tube have already emerged, with people saying sweaty fingers have given Touch ID difficulty registering fingerprints, as well as blaming Pay for taking longer to register at a barrier than Oyster cards.

14/07/2015:Apple Paylaunched today in the UK, allowing people to swap their credit and debit cards for quicker payments made via iPhone or Apple Watch.

Its release means Apple customers who own the latest range of devices can buy goods and services worth up to 20 by simply holding their smartphone or smartwatch near a contactless reader.

The UK launch is the first overseas expansion of Apple Pay, which launched in the US in October last year, and can be used after downloading the latest version of iOS, version 8.4.

Adoption in Britain will outpace the "modest" uptake seen in the US, according to analyst house Forrester, which pointed to a more established contactless payment ecosystem in the UK.

Analyst Thomas Husson added: "The inclusion of Transport for London as a partner is a way to raise awareness and accelerate daily usage. Apple will [also] benefit from a larger installed base of compatible devices and from the awareness created by the media buzz from the US launch."

Apple Pay can I use it?

Only Apple customers can use Apple Pay and only those who own one of Apple's latest devices.

The iPhone 6, iPad Air 2 and iPad Mini 3 are all Apple Pay compatible because they offer both Touch ID - Apple's fingerprint sensor technology. Only the iPhone 6 (and its bigger counterpart, the 6 Plus) can be used in physical bricks and mortar shops though as iPads lack the necessary Near Field Communication (NFC) chips which allow Apple Pay to communicate with contactless payment readers. Apple's tablets can still use Apple Pay to authorise purchase in apps.

Owners of the tech giant's much-vaunted Apple Watch can also use Apple Pay.

Apple Pay how does it work?

Pay acts like many other digital wallets out there by integrating your credit or debit card into an app.

Specifically, Apple uses Passbook to store your card details, and there is no need to open the app to make a payment. Passbook will be renamed Wallet in the upcoming iOS 9.

Similar to other contactless payment methods, Apple Pay uses NFC to communicate with contactless payment readers, but it relies on extra security measures than banks' contactless credit or debit cards.

These measures are two-fold one uses Touch ID, Apple's fingerprint sensor, to ensure it is you who is making the payment.

The other, tokenisation, issues a one-time code to the retailer receiving payment to ensure the transaction is only completed once. Plus, the one-time code means any hackers that breach the retailer's systems won't gain access to your card details.

Apple Pay how do I set it up and use it?

As usual with Apple, the set-up process is sleek and simple. All you need to do is add your credit or debit card details from your iTunes account to Passbook by entering the card's security code.

Extra cards can be added within Passbook by tapping the plus' sign, then following the instructions on-screen.

Those using iPad Air 2 or iPad Mini 3 can open Settings, tap Passbook & Apple Pay', then choose to add a credit or debit card.

To set it up on your smartwatch, simply open the Apple Watch app on your iPhone and follow the same process.

For iPhone 6, iPad Air 2 or Mini 3 users, there's no need to open your Passbook app or wake your phone up when using Apple Pay. Instead, the NFC chip communicates with the contactless reader when you hold your phone near it.

Simply holding your finger on Touch ID during this process verifies the payment is not fraudulent, and the phone will vibrate and beep when the transaction is complete.

All Apple Watch users need to do is double click the side button and hold the smartwatch display up to the contactless reader the same vibration and beep signify that your payment is complete.

Apple Pay which banks and credit card companies support it?

A whole host of banks have already signed up to support Apple's new innovation, including Royal Bank of Scotland, NatWest, Santander, Citi, American Express, Ulster Bank and Nationwide.

More are expected to offer support in the autumn, including Lloyds, Halifax, M&S Bank, Bank of Scotland and TSB.

However, despite HSBC being listed as a launch partner, and leaking the official release date on Twitter a day early, it expects to introduce the service by the end of July.

Meanwhile, Barclays has decided to take its time, simply saying it would introduce it "in the future".

Both Visa and MasterCard cards are compatible with Apple Pay, and both providers claim they bring additional security to the payments process.

Visa Europe said its tokenisation technology underpins Apple Pay, by providing a one-off number to each payment, to ensure each transaction goes through only once.

MasterCard's Digital Enablement Service uses EMV cryptography on top of Apple Pay's own measures.

Apple Pay how much can I spend?

An existing 20 cap limits the sum of any single transaction, but this will rise to 30 in September.

Higher value payments can only be made when retailers have upgraded their contactless software, according to Visa Europe, which expects 80 per cent of terminals to be able to accept these by the end of 2015.

Apple Pay where can I use it?

You can use Apple Pay in just about any shop that uses contactless readers, of which there are 2.6 million terminals across Europe, according to Visa Europe.

Reports of people using it at Tesco, Starbucks, and other retailers have emerged while Apple has officially partnered with Transport for London (TfL) to enable Pay on the capital's public transport.

TfL's customer experience director, Shashi Verma, said: "With around one in ten of all contactless transactions in the UK now taking place on our transport services in London, we are delighted to welcome Apple Pay as another new and convenient contactless way for our customers to pay for their travel.

"I would encourage anyone who uses pay as you go to try contactless. There's no need to top-up, just touch in and out with your mobile device, credit or debit card."

Other launch partners include Boots, Waitrose, M&S, Post Office, McDonald's, Costa Coffee, Nandos, BP and Pret A Manger.

Online, you can use Apple Pay with easyJet, Just Eat, Hailo, Topshop, Zara, Miss Selfridge, British Airways, Addison Lee and Argos.

Apple Pay who are its rivals and how will it affect banks?

Despite what the launch data hubbub might lead you to believe, Apple Pay is only the latest in a line of mobile payment offerings.

Google is set to launch Android Pay, which also uses NFC, as part of its Android M operating system later this year, while Samsung revealed Samsung Pay at Mobile World Congress.

This will be compatible with Samsung's Galaxy S6 and, likes its rivals, uses NFC.

Existing digital wallets like PayPal are having to adapt to Apple Pay. Apple's payments system could, in the tradition of its other products, remake the mobile payments industry in its own mould.

PayPal is adapting by planning to enable businesses to accept Apple Pay via its own PayPal Here card reader, while its mobile payments arm, Braintree, will support Pay with a new SDK.

"At Braintree, we're continuously expanding our platform to enable merchants to deliver the best commerce experiences, and our extension of Apple Pay support to UK developers furthers our mission to support multiple wallets," said general manager of mobile, Aunkur Arya.

While Apple Pay experienced relatively slow take-up in the US, the UK is much more ready to accept such a product.

Last week, Visa Europe announced one billion contactless payments occurred across Europe in the last year, while it predicts people will spend 1.2 billion a week via contactless by 2020.

Despite this popularity, banks have been relatively slow to respond. Notably, Barclays and HSBC, both of which did not support Pay at launch, have their own rival services.

HSBC's Paym can send money using only a mobile number via the bank's mobile banking app while Barclays' bPay is an NFC device users can buy as a wristband, key fob or sticker.

But Apple Pay could cause problems for such innovations, according to application analysis firm App Annie.

Danielle Levitas,SVP of research and analysis said: "The launch of Apple Pay has the potential to shake up the banking and payments industries. Although Apple Pay is not the first of its kind, the company's reach and ability to evangelise is central to driving mobile payments adoption.

"Apple doesn't need to have a monopoly in payments to drive change in consumer behaviour and retailer POS systems. Delivering a best in class service that is widely promoted, Apple has the ability to turn another sector on its head."

However, other rival services are in the works, such as Zapp, which will launch in October with the backing of Sainsbury's, Asda, House of Fraser, Thomas Cook, HSBC, First Direct, Nationwide, and Santander.

Additionally, Barclays has confirmed it will also support Zapp at launch.

While a wide range of offerings will ensure Apple doesn't have a monopoly on the mobile payments market, companies that fail to adapt to the new technology will fall behind, warned Fujitsu.

Sarah Kellett, associate director of consumer-facing industries, said: "Retailers who fail to see the opportunity with Apple Pay and mobile payment services risk placing a barrier at the point of sale.

"Ultimately the more payment options available to customers, the easier it will be for retailers to make transactions and as a result, sales."

Some of the big financial names are noticeable by their absence, probably because they currently have their own contactless payment methods that will compete with Apple Pay.

The UK launch of Apple Pay will see it available in more than 250,000 locations - many more than when it was first made available in the States.

Apple Pay has gained support from many of the retailers UK consumers know and love.

UK users will also be able to pay for journeys on London Transport using Apple Pay. Apple's current Passbook app will also be rebranded as Apple Wallet, the company confirmed during the WWDC keynote, reflecting its new status for managing stored payment and store cards in addition to loyalty cards and tickets.

Users will be able to pay for bus and tube journeys in London in the same waythey do currently with their Oyster Cards when Apple Pay comes to the UK.

But will Apple Pay prove popular in the UK - and elsewhere around the world - and will it ever truly replace other forms of payment such as cash and card (read our feature on contactless payments for more information)?

Dennis Jones, CEO of UK mobile payments company Judo Payments, seems to think so.

"Apple Pay coming to the UK is the next step to not just a cashless, but also cardless society which I believe is just years away. Apple starting with 250,000 locations in the UK shows Apple's commitment to a larger launch than in the US," he said.

"For us in the UK's capital we can say goodbye to the Oyster card with Apple Pay's seamless process coming to TfL from July. Not only that but Apple Pay is coming to social in the form of immediate payment using Pinterest pins this area seems rife for expansion in the coming months/years."

Apple is not alone in the contactless space. In addition to some of the big financial names having their own offerings, many of Apple's traditional competitors have also launched their own payment methods. Indeed, Samsung Pay and Android Payboth look set to challenge Apple for the contactless throne.

Samsung revealed its rival service at MWC in March, for which the company partnered with MasterCard. Unlike Apple Pay, however, Samsung Pay doesn't use NFC and will be compatible with magnetic-stripe technology.

Android Pay, meanwhile, will be released with the new Android M mobile OS later in 2015, but Apple has the notable advantage of being compatible with smartwatches.

Banks had previously been slow to take the service up, but the beginning of 2015 has seen many more choose to support Apple Pay, including smaller or local banks. Apple claims that 220,000 stores across the US including McDonalds and Macy's currently accept the service.

At the end of 2014, the Telegraph reported that UK banks were concerned about privacy with Apple Pay, with one stating it was "uncomfortable" with the personal and financial data the service would collect on users. This may explain why Barclays was one of the few major British banks not currently supporting Apple Pay.

This story was first published on 12/01/2015 and has been updated several times (most recently on 21/12/15) to reflect new information and developments.

Visa has debuted a new contactless payment ring, which is scheduled for a test-run at the 2016 Rio Olympic Games.

The ring will contain a Gemalto-manufactured chip and an NFC antenna, and will be waterproof to a depth of 50 meters. Crucially, the ring also uses tokenisation, which uses a unique digital key for transactions, rather than any identifiable account details.

The technology will be initially trialed at this year's Olympics in Rio de Janeiro, where it will be used by 45 Visa-sponsored Olympians. If successful, the company will reportedly look at the possibility of a wider rollout at some point in the future.

The ring works like any other contactless payment technology - simply touch the ring to a contactless terminal, and the payment will be processed automatically. The rings are currently linked to prepaid contactless debit cards that can be loaded up via a website.

The announcement marks a general trend away from traditional payment methods, with Apple Pay, Android Pay and contactless cards all becoming increasingly prevalent.

However, a full deployment of Visa's contactless ring may face trouble, as reports suggest that similar technologies like Apple Pay have met with limited enthusiasm.

Reuters reports that outside of the US, adoption of Apple Pay has been slow, with local competitors in China freezing it out of the most lucrative global markets. Mobile payments in the country totalled around $1 trillion last year, according to data from iResearch.

"Visa's first payment ring puts smart payment technology right on the hands of our athletes for convenient and easy payments," said Jim McCarthy, executive vice president of innovation and strategic partnerships at Visa.

"As an Olympian, rings have a special meaning to me," said Missy Franklin, a four-time Olympic gold medalist and Team Visa athlete.

"The Visa ring is a great innovation that I know all the athletes competing in Rio will enjoy as it will be great to go from a competition to purchase without having to carry a wallet or card."

The "surge" in contactless payments has been boosted by mobile payment services, which are set to influence the how payments are made in future, members of the UK consumer finance sector told IT Pro.

"The use of contactless payments has surged over the past year, with monthly spending now at 1.5 billion more than three times what it was last year," a spokesman for The UK Cards Association told IT Pro. "On the high street, one in six card transactions is now contactless as consumers increasingly use cards instead of cash for lower value payments."

Digital wallets, such as Apple Pay and the newly launched Android Pay, are expected to have a significant impact on how consumers pay for goods at retail, Adrian Buckle, chief economist for Payments UK told IT Pro.

"Payments via mobile phones, whether through an app, browser, or as part of a contactless payment will undoubtedly help to shape the way we pay in coming years," said Buckle.

"These new mobile payment technologies are expected to be embraced in particular by younger people and with the exception of banking app payments the majority, such as Android Pay and Apple Pay, are methods used to initiate card payments.

"By using near field communication (NFC) technology similar to contactless cards at the point-of-sale, these types of mobile payments may further increase the volume of contactless card payments."

Spending above the current contactless payment limit is one factor that may become more common as a result of demand for retailers to support mobile payment services.

The national limit for transactions on contactless cards is 30 increased from 20 on September 1, 2015.

However, both Android Pay and Apple Pay, support contactless payments over 30. Banks contacted by IT Pro, including the Lloyds Banking Group, Nationwide, HSBC and credit card provider MBNA, all said they already have the infrastructure in place to support larger contactless payments, which require further user verification.

For contactless payments over 30 on Android Pay and Apple Pay, additional verification such as entering a pin code or fingerprint sensor approval is needed from the user.

All of banks we spoke to said it was up to the merchant's appetite to accept payments over 30. IT Pro has contacted some UK retailers for a response.

Google launched Android Pay in the UK last Wednesday. It is planning on adding further mobile web support to the service in coming months.

Fitbit is gearing up to introduce mobile payments to its smartwatches with the acquisition of intellectual property from Coin.

The nascent company, based in Silicon Valley, is the creator of two novel payment methods. The first is a smart credit card, also called coin, that holds all of a users' credit cards on one single device. The second, which it has collaborated with MasterCard to create, is a method of integrating payments systems into wearables.

It is the intellectual property for this latter technology that Fitbit acquired last week, although the official announcement has only just been made now. The deal also includes "key personnel", who will join the Fitbit team.

In a statement, James Park, the CEO and co-founder of Fitbit, said: "We are focused on making wearable devices that motivate people to reach their health and fitness goals, and that also make their lives easier with the smart features they need most.

"Coin has been one of the key innovators in advanced payment solutions. The inclusion of their payment technology into our offerings will further our strategy of making Fitbit products an indispensable part of people's lives."

The deal does spell bad news for owners of Coin's own Coin 2.0 wearable device and developers for the platform.

In a statement on its own site, Coin said that customers can continue to use Coin 2.0 until the battery runs out, but it will not be issuing replacements, and Coin Rewards and the Coin Developer Program have been retired with immediate effect.

While this acquisition could, potentially, put the company on a road to competing with Apple Pay and Android Pay, it does not look like Fitbit will be releasing a wearable with payments technology any time soon the company said there are "no plans to integrate Coin's wearable payments technology into the 2016 Fitbit product roadmap".

However, there's no doubt Apple sees the Watch as an important product, one which will be a significant business for it in the long run. Plus, it's well-crafted enough that it will influence other smartwatch makers making the Apple Watch a glimpse into the near future.

Conclusions

Compared to other smartwatches, Apple Watch isn't a revolutionary product nor does it do anything profoundly unique.

Having said that, it is significantly better than any of the Android Wear or Tizen watches released so far by the likes of Motorola, Samsung and LG. It's better looking on the wrist, there are more options available if you care about how it looks, and the software although obviously unfinished in places is slick and easy to use.

There's enough here to give us a glimpse of the future of the smartwatch, and on that basis we think the future of the Apple Watch and of smartwatches in general looks pretty bright.

Smartwatches are almost, by definition, luxuries. But if you're tightly wedded to iOS, then the Apple Watch adds enough day-to day convenience to make buying one worth considering. Many of the interactions you would have had to pull your phone out to do can now be done on your wrist. It's particularly useful for the kind of quick interactions checking the time, reading a message which, if you'd have pulled out your phone, would probably have lead into five minutes of reading email, checking Twitter, and so on. In that sense, it's a time saver.

It's hard to capture the entire experience of such a personal device in a review, which will inevitably focus on tangibles: the specs, the appearance, and so on. However, it's worth saying that, despite having tried many smartwatches in the past, the Apple Watch is the first one which hasn't failed our 'three week test'. Where other smartwatches tend to stop getting picked up and put on the wrist after a few weeks of use, the Apple Watch is something we still put on every morning, and miss if it's not there. That's a good indication that, in the long term, Apple is on to something with the Apple Watch.

This review was originally published on 01/09/15 and has been updated multiple times (most recently on 21/4/16)

Verdict

It's hardly essential, but the Apple Watch's series of small conveniences add up to a surprisingly meaningful and useful experience

Requires iPhone 5 or later running iOS 8 or later; Not compatible with iPad or iPod Touch

Banks could be the key to driving growth of mobile payments across the UK, a new report of consumer habits from payment infrastructure provider VocaLink has suggested.

The Next Generation Payments Report, an independent study of 5,000 UK consumers from VocaLink and conducted by Illuminas, found that those using mobile payments on their smartphones has risen to 15 per cent, up from three per cent in 2013. In contrast, 46 per cent used their device for mobile banking, up from 27 per cent in 2013.

Though much of this activity is categorised as "passive" (e.g. checking balances), there was also a move towards more active use with one in four using their phones to transfer funds to others and between accounts.

Cara O'Nions, marketing and customer insight director at VocaLink, said: "Mainstream banks have the biggest opportunity, since mobile banking and payments are seen by consumers as an extension of a relationship that already exists. Respondents were much more likely to use new payment technology if prompted by their bank, as they trusted and indeed expected them to provide these services."

Apple unveiled its own contactless payments service in July, while Android Pay and Samsung Pay have also been respectively launched. Despite the popularity of such services, however, banks have been notably slow to respond, with Barclays and HSBC failing to support Apple Pay when it launched.

According to the study, barriers to adoption include confusion among consumers about how mobile payments work and a lack of knowledge about which brands offer which services within the sector. However, half of respondents said banking brands would be a key driver for them using mobile payment technology.

Security concerns are also a factor, with fears over phone loss and insecure mobile networks joining concerns of a phone's battery running out during purchase, the technology not being widely available and network issues on consumers' list of potential deterrents.

"The mobile payments space is still in its infancy, but this market moves quickly and we expect big changes over the next few years," O'Nions continued.

"Banks are uniquely placed to develop the next generation of payment services through compelling solutions that increase brand engagement and loyalty -- but if banks want to take ownership of this space before one of their ambitious rivals does, they need to move quickly to make mobile payments the new norm."

Paypal has joined with Bouncepad to bring contactless payment technology to smaller businesses at a lower price, using the PayPal Here card reader and Bouncepad tablet enclosure to create a custom solution.

Users just need to bundle the new PayPal Here card reader with the Bouncepad PayPal tablet enclosure and custom card reader cradle which, once they are registered with PayPal Here, enables small businesses to offer a contactless payment solution to their customers.

Tobi Schneidler, CEO of Bouncepad, said: "We're excited to extend our long-standing relationship with PayPal to continue helping small businesses innovate their POS systems. Working together, we're able to offer a sophisticated tablet POS solution that helps small business owners across industries like hospitality and retail make it simple and affordable to join the contactless payment revolution."

Other contactless payment hardware has often proved to be out of reach for many start-ups and small businesses, mainly due to the cost of licenses, long-term contracts and processing fees. PayPal and Bouncepad's collaboration aims to provide a different, cost-effective solution, the firms said.

Last month, it emerged that use of contactless technology is on the up, with Visa announcing that 1bn contactless payments have been made in Europe over the previous 12 months and 8.92 billion spent using it since launch.

"Contactless momentum continues to build as more and more people discover it's often the quickest and most convenient way to pay for everyday things," Sandra Alzetta, executive director of Core Products at Visa Europe said.

"Across Europe, usage levels have soared, with more than one billion contactless transactions made by Visa cardholders in the last 12 months alone. The popularity of contactless will only increase in future as we experience the next generation of digital payments, where the simplicity and convenience is extended to mobile and wearable NFC technology."

PayPal was fined $25 million (16 million) back in May, for apparently luring customers to sign up for its PayPal Credit service by offering promotional rates and then forcing them to use the service regardless if whether they wished to use another payment option.

National Lottery customers will now be able to pay for their tickets using Barclays' secure payment system, Pingit.

The technology is supported for customers wishing to play any of the National Lottery games, including Lotto, Thunderball and EuroMillions using their smartphone or tablet, provided they're happy to opt for a Lucky Dip ticket rather than choosing their own numbers. Fans just need to download the Pingit app onto their device, or scan a QR code to play and pay.

If a player wins from a ticket purchased via the Pingit app, they will be able to instantly withdraw funds up to 50,000 through their account, straight into their bank account.

Tim Copper, digital director at Camelot, said: "With faster payment and registration, Pingit will make it even easier for our players to enjoy the excitement of National Lottery games on the go, with the added security offered by Barclays. This collaboration with Barclays represents a real breakthrough in speed and simplicity for our players and underlines how we're continuing to radically enhance The National Lottery playing experience.

Pingit allows anyone to send and receive money using just their mobile number, even if they're not a Barclays customer. You can also donate money to charities using the app and pay bills from your mobile devices.

Darren Foulds, managing director of Pingit and mobile payments at Barclays, added: "We're proud to be working with Camelot, making life easier for players to pay for National Lottery games straight from their mobile, with a secure, instant and simple way to pay.

"This is a great example of how Pingit has expanded from being the first person-to-person mobile payments app in the UK to now being a viable digital option for paying for everyday goods and services from a mobile phone."

The National Lottery decided to start looking at mobile-based payment tech following research that revealed 60 per cent of visits to the National Lottery website coming via smartphones and tablets.