The Samsung Pay app is currently live in the Google Play store in South Africa. Samsung Pay is an app which allows you to store your bank card details on a device, and pay merchants by tapping or “swiping” your smartphone rather than a physical bank card.
The app gives you the privilege of making payments via Magnetic Secure Transmission, which mimics the magnetic stripe on the back of your card. The app also allows you to use NFC in contactless cards for “tap-and-go” payments.
At the moment, the service does not appear to be active, however, a page has been displayed stating that Standard Bank will be a local launch partner, supporting Standard Bank Mastercard credit and cheque cards, while debit cards will be supported soon.
On the other hand, Absa, in association with Samsung South Africa, will soon also be offering its customers early access to Samsung Pay before the service is commercially launched in South Africa. Absa said that selected customers will be invited to join the early access program over the coming days, however it emphasizing that it would never contact them directly via sms or emails to register for Samsung Pay using hyperlinks and attachments provided in the sms or email.
Strong rumours suggest that Samsung Pay will officially be launched in South Africa by late August or early September.
Samsung Pay will support the following devices when it launches: Samsung Galaxy Note 8, Galaxy S9 and S9+, Galaxy S8 and S8+, Galaxy S7 and S7 Edge, Galaxy A8 (2018), Galaxy A7 (2017 and newer), and the Galaxy A5 (2017 and newer).
