4 ms·

Whinge: but the term "Tap to Pay" winds me up. "Hover to Pay" maybe, or "Contactless" makes sense. But tap the card reader with your card and you disturb the to

Whinge: but the term "Tap to Pay" winds me up. "Hover to Pay" maybe, or "Contactless" makes sense. But tap the card reader with your card and you disturb the touchscreen and cancel the payment. Don't tap it's a trick.

hunter2_ 5y ago
Yeah, I never understood why "tap" and "contactless" became synonymous in this context, given that "tap" is an onomatopoeia for the sound of two objects making contact. Is it possible that "contactless" actually refers to lack of electrical contacts (i.e., not using the gold pads)? We already have plenty of words for this idea: radio, wireless, inductive. Or is the intent to mean no physical contact whatsoever such that a tap would only be accidental?
- bluk 5y ago
  For most people, I bet it's more of a marketing term. When people hear "contactless", they might think that someone can steal your credit card number or charge you just by being in the same area.
- numpad0 5y ago
  It’s not of both; significance of contactless technology that are used in Tap to [__] is that they require neither electrical nor physical connections. There are other RF-based technologies that require no conductive surfaces but some sort of mechanical touches. The reason why the users are instructed to slam the card or device is because users fail to perform required actions if simply told to hold the card or phones just right. Spatial cognition isn’t a forte for many. The reason why tap is used in VISA contactless over touch is probably because Suica system used by JR East uses the phrase “Suica is touch 1-second”.
- joshvm 5y ago
  It's physically easier to touch the reader than to hover over it? Especially if the reader is a bit janky/older and takes time to complete the transaction. If you look at Oyster (TFL) for example, most people physically touch their cards to the turnstile/bus readers. The official advertising also uses the phrase "tap in, tap out" for stations where there are no barriers. "Contactless" is also fairly widely used in the UK - e.g. "do you take contactless?". Contactless is because in theory you don't need to touch your card to the reader. My new phone seems to have a good enough antenna (active?) that it triggers the POS terminal much further away than my debit card, but usually the activation distance is small enough that tapping is easier.
banana_giraffe 5y ago
Well, "Hover around hunting for the NFC antenna" is less catchy than "Tap to Pay". I always assumed the term tap to pay caught on since the early EFTPOS terminals had the NFC antenna in a separate portion of the terminal, or under a non-touchscreen panel, so the tap of a credit card wasn't detrimental to the user experience, and now we're stuck with the term.
exikyut 5y ago
To me "tap to pay" encodes immediate-term incidentality and proximity. It's three syllables, it rolls off the tongue when you say it, it takes maybe 450ms to speak, and the brain can encode it using similar (or maybe the same?) mechanisms to how brand names and word combinations are captured without parsing/questioning when very young. This is one of many factors that contributes to a sort of "flow" that combats the "oooooooooh that sounds complicated"-of-death that stands to kill new complex digital products that need to be adopted en mass to function. "Tap" also encodes "move near reader" but does so by suggesting that you move too close. Thus you'll either have people moving well within the active area (at which point the transaction may even be able to start and complete by the time it's been tapped). It's also physically easier for me to physically execute "tap object against other object" than "hover object 1cm in front of other object", especially when moving. If you want something to scale, you need fail-safe design. My local bus transit system has a giant (but featureless) NFC pad with a screen saying "Tap here " above it. The number of people I see tapping the screen is... the screen should obviously say "below", the active area should have a ring of LEDs around it, etc etc etc; it's broken design. However, I've also seen people doing the same thing (tapping the screen) with payment terminals. In situations like this, you're designing the system to be viable for the dumbest user.
rootusrootus 5y ago
For all practical purposes, though, it's a tap for most people. What's the limit on NFC? 1.5 inches? At least half of everyone that uses it will inadvertently hit the screen anyway. The UI should be designed with that expectation IMO.
BenjiWiebe 5y ago
I do tap to pay, though. Contactless as in no electrical contacts and no human-to-human contacts.

hunter2_ 5y ago

Yeah, I never understood why "tap" and "contactless" became synonymous in this context, given that "tap" is an onomatopoeia for the sound of two objects making contact. Is it possible that "contactless" actually refers to lack of electrical contacts (i.e., not using the gold pads)? We already have plenty of words for this idea: radio, wireless, inductive. Or is the intent to mean no physical contact whatsoever such that a tap would only be accidental?

bluk 5y ago
For most people, I bet it's more of a marketing term. When people hear "contactless", they might think that someone can steal your credit card number or charge you just by being in the same area.
numpad0 5y ago
It’s not of both; significance of contactless technology that are used in Tap to [__] is that they require neither electrical nor physical connections. There are other RF-based technologies that require no conductive surfaces but some sort of mechanical touches. The reason why the users are instructed to slam the card or device is because users fail to perform required actions if simply told to hold the card or phones just right. Spatial cognition isn’t a forte for many. The reason why tap is used in VISA contactless over touch is probably because Suica system used by JR East uses the phrase “Suica is touch 1-second”.
joshvm 5y ago
It's physically easier to touch the reader than to hover over it? Especially if the reader is a bit janky/older and takes time to complete the transaction. If you look at Oyster (TFL) for example, most people physically touch their cards to the turnstile/bus readers. The official advertising also uses the phrase "tap in, tap out" for stations where there are no barriers. "Contactless" is also fairly widely used in the UK - e.g. "do you take contactless?". Contactless is because in theory you don't need to touch your card to the reader. My new phone seems to have a good enough antenna (active?) that it triggers the POS terminal much further away than my debit card, but usually the activation distance is small enough that tapping is easier.

banana_giraffe 5y ago

Well, "Hover around hunting for the NFC antenna" is less catchy than "Tap to Pay". I always assumed the term tap to pay caught on since the early EFTPOS terminals had the NFC antenna in a separate portion of the terminal, or under a non-touchscreen panel, so the tap of a credit card wasn't detrimental to the user experience, and now we're stuck with the term.

exikyut 5y ago

To me "tap to pay" encodes immediate-term incidentality and proximity. It's three syllables, it rolls off the tongue when you say it, it takes maybe 450ms to speak, and the brain can encode it using similar (or maybe the same?) mechanisms to how brand names and word combinations are captured without parsing/questioning when very young. This is one of many factors that contributes to a sort of "flow" that combats the "oooooooooh that sounds complicated"-of-death that stands to kill new complex digital products that need to be adopted en mass to function. "Tap" also encodes "move near reader" but does so by suggesting that you move too close. Thus you'll either have people moving well within the active area (at which point the transaction may even be able to start and complete by the time it's been tapped). It's also physically easier for me to physically execute "tap object against other object" than "hover object 1cm in front of other object", especially when moving. If you want something to scale, you need fail-safe design. My local bus transit system has a giant (but featureless) NFC pad with a screen saying "Tap here " above it. The number of people I see tapping the screen is... the screen should obviously say "below", the active area should have a ring of LEDs around it, etc etc etc; it's broken design. However, I've also seen people doing the same thing (tapping the screen) with payment terminals. In situations like this, you're designing the system to be viable for the dumbest user.

rootusrootus 5y ago

For all practical purposes, though, it's a tap for most people. What's the limit on NFC? 1.5 inches? At least half of everyone that uses it will inadvertently hit the screen anyway. The UI should be designed with that expectation IMO.

BenjiWiebe 5y ago

I do tap to pay, though. Contactless as in no electrical contacts and no human-to-human contacts.