Worldline Enables Apple Pay Support In Germany; Khalti Rolls Out eTicketing Feature

Welcome to The Axis, your late look at payments news from around the world. Coverage includes Wordline’s support of Google Pay and Apple Pay through its payment terminals in Germany. Singapore’s Scoot budget airline will allow customers to make payments through PayNow, Nepal’s Khalti has rolled out an eTicketing feature on its platform and mobile payments are on the rise in China.

Europe’s Wordline is now supporting Google Pay and Apple Pay through its payment terminals in Germany, the company said in an announcement on Monday (March 18). Users can make payments through their smartwatches or smartphones with the option, which makes identify verification through face recognition or fingerprints at a near field communication (NFC) terminal. In addition, an extra layer of security is provided by tokenization technology, which makes a barrier between stored payment data and the actual transaction. Worldline Head of Merchant Services Germany Panagiotis Karasavvoglou said, according to the announcement, “With the acceptance of Apple Pay and Google Pay, Worldline is helping merchants address a broad and emerging customer base that seeks flexibility and security for their payments.”

On another note, Singapore’s Scoot budget airline will allow customers to make payments when making flight reservations through a PayNow service, The Business Times reported. Through the offering, which is made in collaboration with United Overseas Bank (UOB), customers will receive a quick-response (QR) on their screens that they can use a mobile app of a participating bank in PayNow to scan. UOB, in turn, will confirm the payment and Scott will offer a webpage indicating the successful reservation of the flight after the user confirms the recipient and payment amount. UOB Head of Group Transaction Banking and Group Wholesale Banking Lay Hua said, according to the report, “Enabling PayNow as an additional payment mode will greatly enhance the book-and-pay experience for Scoot’s customers as it is a simpler and faster way to pay.”

In other news, Nepal’s Khalti, has rolled out an eTicketing feature on its platform that uses QR codes to let users purchase paperless tickets, Nepali Telecom reported. Through an “Event” section on its website and app, organizers can make their events published and users can book tickets. Users, in turn, get a QR code of a ticket along with a PDF file. Once they arrive at the entrance of an event, they can use their smartphones to show their QR codes. Khalti, which was rolled out at the beginning of 2017, enables users to make payments for hotel bookings and utilities, among other offerings.

And customers in China made 60.5 billion mobile payments last year, marking an annual growth rate in the number of mobile transactions of 61.2 percent, KrAsia reported. At the same time, the outlet reported that the mobile payment transaction volume last year was $41.3 trillion or  277.4 trillion RMB — a rise of 36.7 percent from the year before. Research Center for Internet and Society at the Communication University of Zhejiang Director Fang Xingdong told the outlet, “There are more and more economic activities that can be carried out via mobile payment, and people are less likely to use cash or credit cards than before.”