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Date: Mon, 10 Mar 2014 17:04:02 +0100
Message-ID: <CANEZrP11WDsQD4KFfd8Fi4zfXKRM9vVZkZ-oznMJvjY=5=A31A@mail.gmail.com>
From: Mike Hearn <mike@plan99.net>
To: Bitcoin Dev <bitcoin-development@lists.sourceforge.net>
Content-Type: multipart/alternative; boundary=001a11c32c369d8c8204f442c0cb
Subject: Re: [Bitcoin-development] Instant / contactless payments
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>
> I just did my first contactless nfc payment with a MasterCard. It worked
> very well and was quite delightful - definitely want to be doing more of
> these in future.
>

A bit more competitive intelligence - turns out that the experience isn't
quite so good after all. After trying a few more times to use contactless
payments, I found it has a ~75% failure rate based on my usage.

By far the biggest problem is also the most predictable - it's very common
here for merchants to require minimum payment sizes before they'll accept
credit cards, often quite high, like 20 CHF or more. But the PIN-less mode
only works for payments below a certain threshold, I haven't quite figured
out what it is yet, but in the UK it's 20 GBP so maybe it's about 30 CHF.
So there turns out to be an incredibly thin price range in which the simple
touch-to-pay system actually works. Most of the time, either they:

a) Reject cards entirely because the payment is too small
b) Don't have the right hardware, or the hardware just mysteriously fails
to work.
c) Require a PIN because the payment is too large

I'm sure Bitcoin can do better than this.

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<div dir=3D"ltr"><div class=3D"gmail_extra"><div class=3D"gmail_quote"><blo=
ckquote class=3D"gmail_quote" style=3D"margin:0 0 0 .8ex;border-left:1px #c=
cc solid;padding-left:1ex"><div dir=3D"ltr">I just did my first contactless=
 nfc payment with a MasterCard. It worked very well and was quite delightfu=
l - definitely want to be doing more of these in future.</div>
</blockquote><div><br></div><div>A bit more competitive intelligence - turn=
s out that the experience isn&#39;t quite so good after all. After trying a=
 few more times to use contactless payments, I found it has a ~75% failure =
rate based on my usage.</div>
<div><br></div><div>By far the biggest problem is also the most predictable=
 - it&#39;s very common here for merchants to require minimum payment sizes=
 before they&#39;ll accept credit cards, often quite high, like 20 CHF or m=
ore. But the PIN-less mode only works for payments below a certain threshol=
d, I haven&#39;t quite figured out what it is yet, but in the UK it&#39;s 2=
0 GBP so maybe it&#39;s about 30 CHF. So there turns out to be an incredibl=
y thin price range in which the simple touch-to-pay system actually works. =
Most of the time, either they:</div>
<div><br></div><div>a) Reject cards entirely because the payment is too sma=
ll</div><div>b) Don&#39;t have the right hardware, or the hardware just mys=
teriously fails to work.</div><div>c) Require a PIN because the payment is =
too large</div>
<div><br></div><div>I&#39;m sure Bitcoin can do better than this.</div><div=
><br></div></div></div></div>

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