Visa Japan Finally Ready to Sign on to Apple Pay Japan?

IT journalist Junya Suzuki was answering a question of mine regarding dual mode (EMV/FeliCa) credit/debit cards which are somewhat mainstream, even on Docomo dCard, but the plastic issue Sumi Trust Visa contactless cards are EMV only.

I guess Visa Japan still wants to promote payWave (banded as Visa Touch in Japan) over better customer service. Because if Visa was promoting better customer service, they would offer dual mode for plastic cards and Apple Pay like Mastercard and American Express do.

Visa Japan has yet to sign directly with Apple Pay, the reason why Japanese issue Visa cards don’t work for Apple Pay Suica Recharge, but there may be hope. Suzuki san’s tweet suggests Visa Japan might finally sign with Apple Pay, “in the very near future.”

I certainly hope so, but given that Visa Japan has ‘been in discussions with Apple’ to officially join Apple Pay Japan since the service launched in October 2016, and have done nothing the whole time, I’ll believe it when I see it.