Contactless Limit to rise to £100 in October

Heard of a bank called Starling :grin:

It allows this :point_up_2:

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It is, but Google Pay works all the time (like a contactless card) below the limit.

You have to unlock the phone, I believe, for it to suddenly become authenticated and allow it to work above the limit (which is basically Apple Pay all the time).

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You do :+1:

Ridiculous!

And I thought you could use PayPoint for exactly that sort of transaction (not that I’ve done it).

There was probably confusion around PayPoint not being the same as the Post Office and it therefore not being possible to process Bank Giro Credit bills, which is likely what the meeting was about.

Lol

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I still remember when Apple Pay first came out and every time you used it everybody in a 5 metre radius would be dumbfounded as if you’d just performed some magic sorcery!

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PS: Sorry to everyone interested, I know I should have posted about this at the time!

I did intend to, but just forgot. Oops.

I’m not seeing this.

There’s an option for card present (presumably turning this off leaves mobile wallet on, as I was allowed to use Apple Pay before even using the physical card), but this covers both contactless and chip and pin from the sounds of things. I’d want chip and pin to remain active.

Granted it’s better than nothing, and better than what most others offer from what I gather.

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I suppose it’s not an ideal solution, but assuming you were not really out in the sticks you could always keep it off, then turn it back on if you had to use Chip and PIN.

Not great, as it relies on you remembering to turn it back on, but better perhaps than needing to leave the toggle on?

Edit: Also, I’ve just realised I’ve broken the unwritten foruming rule of not double-posting (and have, in fact, done about a quintuple post). Apologies to everyone for this, but I don’t think one long post would really have worked!

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That’s the thing with me. I always have cash withdrawals turned off on my cards when I have the option. Then I need cash and I completely forget it’s turned off!

It’s a good thing I never leave the house without my phone!

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I have a solution for that!

Simply keep a buffer balance in your Child & Co account, then always withdraw cash at a Royal Bank or NatWest or Tesco cash machine using RBS Get Cash.

No risk of your card being eaten by the machine, in fact no need to carry a card at all, and you can keep ATMs toggled off everywhere!

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Great news! I hope it will be extended for the EEA.

It wouldn’t be likely as it’s not a Mastercard or Visa initiative, it’s a proprietary thing run by RBS (in partnership with Tesco Bank, as it was once part-owned by RBS and still has a relationship with them; I think they still operate the Tesco ATMs).

I agree that it would be great if Mastercard and Visa developed a global card-less ATM solution though!

Hopefully one day they will, although there’s a danger now that it has been overtaken as a concept by just paying contactlessly instead and cutting out the cash entirely.

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PS: @Mattia I just realised that you could equally have been talking about the larger contactless limit, rather than card-less cash withdrawals.

If it was that, I’d say that it would be totally up to the ECB to decide the EU contactless limit, but currently there is a rule that no increase in the limit can be more than double an existing limit. So it would be unlikely to go all the way to £100 equivalent (maybe something like €75 at the next increase)?

Apparently it’s also generally not seen as a “priority” for the ECB, the last I heard, due to generally higher rates of cash usage in a lot of EU countries - although I know the pandemic has changed this somewhat.

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In fact I meant the Contact-less payment… in italy, withdrawals through this feature, don’t work… I have to go through my bank’s app to make them.

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It’s the same here most of the time!

Some ATMs do have a contactless reader, but it is only for use with the bank’s own cards and you still have to verify the transaction by putting in your PIN anyway. It doesn’t work with Apple Pay at all.

For the RBS Get Cash feature, you generate a “cash code” in the app and then type this in to the ATM to claim the cash. It sounds like the system in Italy works like this.

Proper contactless ATMs only exist in the US, as far as I know, and you verify the withdrawal through Apple Pay (not normal contactless). That would be great if they had it everywhere!

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While I see where you’re coming from with this (the removal of limits, etc) personally I find it more convenient to just grab the physical card out of my wallet than to scroll through Gpay looking for the right card.
Plus as I have mentioned before, I do like to go out at times and leave the phone at home.

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On the other hand, plenty of people these days go out (with their phone) and leave their wallet at home!

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There are still a lot of phones being actively used which don’t support NFC.

A significant number, yes, but the vast majority of main phones currently in use will support it.

Curious as to why. You can set a default card in both Google Pay and Apple Pay and even order them so that you can access them easily by your most used

You could take it with you and just put it on aeroplane mode (or if that doesn’t allow NFC payments, turn WiFi/Mobile Data off), same difference. You’ll still be able to make use of NFC Payments and it might as well be a phone that’s at home.

Also prevents fraud with your card, as there’d be no one able to tap 5x to rinse you of £500 if they wanted to.

If you really insisted on leaving your phone at home and taking your wallet, chip & PIN is there for you

Contactless technologies are the future, but not as they are now. Entirely void of authentication is not good for anyone in the chain aside from the merchant.

It’s you that has to deal with the stress of trying to get it back (even if the money is non-consequential, as my recent scam has taught me) and potential inability to pay bills. There’s also some feeling of molestation that someone has done this.

any phone without NFC these days is a low-end phone that I’d typically attribute to my friends grandad, who uses cash and only has a phone because his fishing place sends you a text for gate authentication. I could not name any phone that hasn’t got NFC, which I think is rather telling.

And in time they all will.

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