JR East and Docomo announced a new version of dBARAI app today one that hooks into Mobile Suica on Android to recharge with dPOINT or dBARAI account balance. Support on iOS is expected to come soon. dPOINT/dBARAI joins an ever growing Mobile Suica recharge backend that includes major credit cards, Rakuten POINT/Rakuten Pay, AU Pay Suica, J-COIN, lots of regional banks via Suitto/LAWSON, and now Docomo.
This is a big deal because there are lots of Docomo users with lots of dPOINT but no place to go. One of the biggest complaints of dPOINT is that yes it’s nice to earn all those points but spending options are limited when compared to the QR payment competition of Rakuten Pay and PayPay. Hooking up dPOINT with Mobile Suica is an easy, practical way to put those points to use for transit and shopping, which in turn earn JRE POINT. As I said before, it’s not about the payment tech anymore, it all about points. Pardon the pun but this is the point that open looper enthusiasts completely miss about Suica: they only see Suica the FeliCa based closed loop transit card, never Suica the business service platform.
So what’s in the Android Mobile Suica dBARAI box? It’s pretty much what we already have with Rakuten Pay on Android: create a special dBARAI branded Suica from the payment app, tap a button to recharge the dBARAI Suica with either the dBARAI balance, dPOINT, or pay with the monthly Docomo bill. No doubt this feature set will be modified for the iOS version when it appears and likely be similar to what iOS Rakuten Pay does: link a Suica already in Wallet and recharge with dPOINT, dBARAI balance or Docomo dCard.
iPhone users will have to wait a bit longer but no doubt Docomo and JR East are working feverishly to get the iOS version out the door. There’s far too much business to be made for them not to push it. That leaves PayPay as the last major holdout but I don’t think it will come soon. Not because SoftBank and JR East don’t want it to happen. They do. The point side of PayPay is squishy compared to Rakuten POINT and dPOINT, it’s still coming into focus. When it does, the landing strip for PayPay Mobile Suica recharge will become clear.
2024-03-29 Update
dBARAI Touch for Apple Pay launched today, with dPOINT recharge for Apple Pay Suica. It’s very different from the Android version: dual mode FeliCa iD and EMV VISA payment networks support and Apple Pay Suica recharge in Wallet app. No special ‘dBARAI Suica to mess with. Just recharge your regular Suica in Wallet with the dBARAI Touch card and you’re done. The dPOINT recharge is automatic but you have to turn off ‘card lock’ in Account Settings > Virtual Card details in iOS dBARAI app. It also uses up time limited about to expire dPOINT first before using regular dPOINT.
2024-03-30 Update
dBARAI Suica recharge with dPOINT stoppped working. It appears to have been a temporary loop hole that Docomo closed quickly. For dPOINT recharge to happen, it likely needs to be a direct pipeline from Docomo to Suica similar to what the Android version does. Updates will be posted here, stay tuned.
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