American Express Mobile NFC

Enable customers to pay with their mobile phones—quickly, easily, and touch-free

Overview

Near-Field Communication (NFC) utilizes the same tap-to-pay technology as contactless chips, but instead of using their Card, consumers can load their payment information onto their NFC-enabled mobile phone.

In addition to the standard contactless features, NFC technology helps to engage consumers in a new way, enabling Merchants to push relevant offers through the phone and delivering a convenient way to pay.

AMEX Digital Solutions provides acquirers with NFC specifications to enable POS terminals to accept American Express Cards on digital wallets and Issuers with solutions to integrate digital wallets to Cardmember’s NFC-enabled phones.

Benefits

Consumer preference:

  • As consumers shift to a mobile first mentality and smartphone usage increases at a rapidly growing rate, digital wallets enable a more convenient payment method.
  • Capture younger, affluent demographic “attached” to their mobile device.

Issuers offer value added services:

  • Increases every day spend for users who always carry mobile devices.
  • Integration with mobile based offers and loyalty programs.
  • Timely response to customer service needs.

Merchants provide convenience:

  • Contactless payments increases speed of payment at the Point-of-Sale.
  • Offer customers who carry their mobile phones more convenience to make payments on the go.

How It Works

 

Customers load their American Express® Card information onto an NFC-enabled phone:

 

  1. NFC Hardware (Secure Element): AMEX Digital Solutions enable Issuers to participate in Digital Payment wallets where a Secure Element is used to store Cardmember data. Apple Pay is an example of a digital wallet where Cardmembers can register their Card details in order to make a purchase at the Point-of-Sale.
  2. NFC Software (Host Card Emulation): AMEX Digital Solutions offers Issuers an option to deploy Mobile NFC independent of Mobile Network Operator. Issuers can integrate the HCE payment app into their existing bank app or utilize HCE to create a standalone payment wallet. HCE-based payments use cloud servers to transmit Cardholder data to a mobile device ready for use at the Point-of-Sale.

 

At checkout, customers tap or hold their NFC-enabled phone in close proximity to the contactless reader which uses radio frequency technology to transfer transaction data.

 

Next Steps

Learn more about American Express Mobile NFC.

Get your product or solution AMEX Enabled.