Apple has launched its Apple Pay service in Malaysia, and customers can now use Apple Pay with their iPhone, Apple Watch, iPad, and Mac.
Thousands of retailers will accept Apple Pay, with support from some of Malaysia's most established banks across major credit and debit networks, the company said in a statement.
"We are delighted to bring Apple Pay to Malaysia, providing an easier, safer, and more secure way to pay with an iPhone, Apple Watch, iPad, or Mac. We think users will love the convenience and security of using Apple Pay," said Jennifer Bailey, Apple's vice president of Apple Pay and Apple Wallet.
Customers with Visa and MasterCard cards from banks including AM-Bank, May-bank, and Standard Chartered Bank can now use Apple Pay, with American Express cards to be available with Apple Pay later this year.
Merchants such as KFC, Maxis, Machines, McDonald's, Pizza Hut, Starbucks, U Mobile, Uniqlo, Village Grocer and apps and websites including Shopee, Sephora and Adidas now offer customers the ability to pay with Apple Pay.
"Our customers in Malaysia will benefit from using Apple Pay with the support of the most popular banks, merchants, and our customer's dream apps" she added.
Apple Pay is available in over 60 countries and regions, and works with more than 10,000 bank and network partners worldwide.
Besides physical in-store transactions, Apple Pay is also enabled for in-app payments and websites. Instead of entering your credit or debit card details with an eCommerce platform, you can just choose "pay with Apple Pay” for a faster checkout process and you don’t even need to wait for the OTP via SMS.
A report from local media suggests that other contactless payment services such as Samsung Pay, Visa or Mastercard require customers to enter a PIN for transactions above RM250 ($56.1); Apple Pay users can simply authenticate these transactions through Face ID, Touch ID or passcode. Apple Pay follows limits set by customers’ banks.
These are just a few features of Apple Pay which are currently enabled in Malaysia and it’s worth highlighting that Malaysia is the second country in Southeast Asia to get it. The other extensive features such as Apple Card, Apple Cash and money transfers via iMessage are not available in our market just yet. In selected markets, Apple Wallet also supports Transit cards which allows you to tap your iPhone or Apple Watch for public transport payments.
Other notable things that are missing are rewards or cashback when using Apple Pay in Malaysia. As a comparison, Samsung Pay provides points for every transaction which you can use to redeem vouchers and other promo items. Meanwhile, several eWallets in Malaysia are also offering coupons, coins and points for each eligible transaction.
Since Samsung Pay has been around since 2016, it has a wider support for banks which include Maybank, Standard Chartered, CIMB, Citi, Hong Leong, Public Bank, HSBC and RHB. Interestingly, AmBank isn’t listed as a supported bank for Samsung Pay. — SoyaCincau
Malaysia is only the second country to get Apple Pay in South East Asia after the service was launched in Singapore in 2016.
Reports from various banks suggest that customers are rapidly adopting digital payments in Malaysia. In 2021, digital transactions reached the 7.2 billion mark, registering a 30% year-on-year growth. Malaysia noted that last year an average person made 221 digital transactions, up from 170 in 2020. A study by the Malaysia Digital Economy Corporation and IDC suggested that the gross transaction value of e-commerce in the country would reach RM25.2 billion ($6 billion) in 2022.
Still now Apple didn't launch Apple Pay in India. In future definitely Apple will launch Apple Pay in India.
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