Halifax & G Pay

Badwolf74

Hi, I'm struggling to understand why the Halifax bank allow limitless mobile payments with Apple Pay but not G Pay. I had a IPhone for years and used Apple Pay all the time and was confident that it would always work well over the then £30 contactless limit, sometimes making payments well over £200 with my iPhone. I then moved to Android and researched G Pay, I was confident that G pay would be the same but alas not. Halifax see it fit to limit G pay users to £45 but allow Apple Pay limitless payments. Typical example my wife has Apple Pay and we had a lunch bill for £60 I tried to pay with GPay on our joint debit card but it got declined, my wife then paid with Apple Pay and hay presto it went through same account/card. Very frustrating especially as I suffer from Crohn's Disease and although not shielding would like to limit the amount of contact points like chip and pin readers.

SuperAllyB

Never used either but is it not G Pay that restricts the limit rather than Halifax?

colsten

I don’t think it’s GPay. It could be Halifax, or it could be the Retailer. The Retailer may put the limit on by themselves, or be given a max limit by their payment services provider, AFAIK

Grumpy_chap

I think, with these contactless payments, the limits need to be sensibly low to prevent fraudulent / theft purchases.  I don't have a contactless credit card and nor do I have a payment service on my phone, but it does occur to me that the security on these systems is rather lax.  

There are people who keep their credit card in a case around their phone and then leave the phone down on the table in public spaces, or easily accessible in a pocket.  The phone is desireable to undesireables and then, very quickly several £45 purchases can be made without any checking.  As the OP says, that can even be several purchases "well over £200 with an iPhone".

If there was no limit, I am sure we would see many threads on here of people saying "my phone / card was lost / stolen and someone took it on a spending spree, why do I have to pay the balance of thousands???"

Badwolf74

I prefer mobile contactless payments as I have to unlock my device with a finger print or face recognition before making a transaction. Hence my frustration at Halifax for limiting GPay users to £45 and allowing Apple Pay users to spend higher amounts. At the moment with Covid and suffering from a immune suppression disease I would like to limit my contact with things in shops by paying with my phone than having to touch a pin card reader. It's just a personal preference and I'm struggling to understand why Halifax allow one payment method more freedom over another considering it basically the same process with extra layers of security.

colsten

Badwolf74 said:

I prefer mobile contactless payments as I have to unlock my device with a finger print or face recognition before making a transaction. Hence my frustration at Halifax for limiting GPay users to £45 and allowing Apple Pay users to spend higher amounts. At the moment with Covid and suffering from a immune suppression disease I would like to limit my contact with things in shops by paying with my phone than having to touch a pin card reader. It's just a personal preference and I'm struggling to understand why Halifax allow one payment method more freedom over another considering it basically the same process with extra layers of security.

I can only speculate. May be it's got to do with the amount of fraud they have seen. AFAIK, there are more Android than iPhones, by a wide margin. So even if the %age of fraudulent users are the same on both platforms, the amount of money at risk could be much higher on Android.

Are you certain, btw, that the retailers you use are actually offering iPhone users higher purchase amounts? I am an ApplePay user, and there are plenty of places which don't accept more than the standard contactless limit on ApplePay. For example, John Lewis didn't take ApplePay on more than £30 for a very long time (they do now), whilst Waitrose always let me pay for unlimited amounts. IIRC, ASDA are still sticking to the contactless limit for ApplePay, too.

EDIT: even the official Apple Support site states: You might not be able to use Apple Pay for purchases over GBP 45. 

Shakin_Steve

I paid a garage bill of £85 last week with google pay linked to Monzo.

SpreadableToast

The most likely explanation is that Google Pay is less secure as it doesn't require biometric authentication as Apple Pay does.

Even if it did, most Android phone manufacturers biometric authentication is ropey, to say the least.

Shakin_Steve

It can't be google, as I posted above, so it's got to be the bank or retailer that sets the limit.

Badwolf74

Halifax have told me four  different things today
1) we limit GPay to £45
2) we do let you pay over the £45
3) GPay limit you to £45
4) it's the merchants limit.

I can pay over the £45 limit with my John Lewis master card so will have to resort to that if over £45 and ensure I pay it off. It's a bit a inconvenience but not the end of the world as I want to stay as safe as possible while out shopping.

born_again

SpreadableToast said:

The most likely explanation is that Google Pay is less secure as it doesn't require biometric authentication as Apple Pay does.

Even if it did, most Android phone manufacturers biometric authentication is ropey, to say the least.

Gpay does require biometric authentication.
Certainly can't use it on my phone without fingerprint unlocking.

Best guess is it is a retailer limit. If it was Halifax or Gpay, it would be every retailer. 
Apple pay is also retailer restricted.

>> 

Tap to pay with speed and security

You can make secure contactless purchases above the £45 limit by just unlocking your phone. Plus, you can check out faster with the device that’s already in your hand – no need to dig for your wallet or use the pin pad.<<