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The article makes Sweden into something it is not. First, Swedes are not as eager to adapt new technologies as it may seem from the text. Case in point, NFC is
by zmk_ 8y ago
The article makes Sweden into something it is not. First, Swedes are not as eager to adapt new technologies as it may seem from the text. Case in point, NFC is just arriving in the country and in one of the main grocery shops, that has its own bank as well, you can only use store cards this way. A small subset of cards are also still swipe-only. In all honesty, Poland seems like a better example of this as it is effectively the sandbox of Europe for consumer finance.
Second, this trend is visible in many countries in Europe. In my 7 years in the Netherlands before I moved to Sweden, it would be unusual for me to have any cash on me and in recent years the number of 'pin' (card) only points of sale there has been growing tremendously.
- alkonaut 8y agoNFC terminals are growing at the same rate as NFC cards, but cards have a pretty long lifespan so my old debit card which is ~5 years old is still chip and pin, while my new credit card from the same bank is both chip+NFC. I’m not going to go through the hassle (a few clicks) of replacing my card just to get NFC. The same goes for retailers, terminals get NFC on the next replacement.
- zmk_ 8y agoMost of the terminals I see are NFC ready, but NFC payments are not enabled. In particular, ICA has Yomani terminals and does not accept cards not issued by them. In other countries NFC has been introduced years ago. In the Netherlands, most of the cards were replaced in 2013 and the full rollout of the tech was in 2014. The fact that a card is valid for longer does not mean that it cannot be replaced beforehand.