Chase has announced a partnership with Visa to bring tap-to-pay to its portfolio of credit cards. Over the next few months, millions of Chase cardholders will be able to experience the fast checkout experience with their credit card, not a digital wallet.
Chase, the largest credit card issuer in the United States, will begin sending out contactless Visa cards later this year. The cards will be sent to cardholders whose cards are being renewed as well as new cardholders. The first contactless cards will be sent to Chase Slate and Chase Freedom Unlimited cardholders. By the first half of 2019, all Chase Visa credit cards and co-branded cards will be contactless. Chase debit cards will have the new feature by the end of 2019.
Contactless payments are touted as secure, fast, and simple thanks to EMV chip technology. To complete the checkout process, the customer taps their card at a credit card machine with the “contactless symbol.” Most transactions will not require a signature. Every contactless transaction will create a unique one-time-use code for payment processing security.
The new Chase contactless credit cards will complement Chase Pay, the credit card giant’s own mobile wallet. With Chase Pay, customers cn use their smartphone to pay for purchases in person without using a physical debit or credit card. The customer’s Visa cards are pre-loaded into Chase Pay, which generates a token or unique code with every transaction. The Chase Pay app can be used to pay with a tap or a unique QR code.
According to Visa and Chase, 40% of Visa transactions outside of the United States use tap-to-pay. Around 70 of the top 100 merchants in the U.S. now offer tap-to-pay functionality at checkout.
Tap-to-pay can be used with contactless debit and credit cards as well as mobile devices like smartphones and fitness trackers through Samsung Pay, Google Pay, and Apple Pay. A growing number of merchants are supporting contactless payments thanks to several clear advantages. Tap-to-pay offers a faster checkout with greater security for cardholders. Merchants do not have to pay extra payment processing fees, either; they will pay the current fees through their merchant services provider on all digital wallet and tap-to-pay transactions.