With the value of Bitcoin having gone from about $4,000 to $15,000 in recent weeks, there’s been an increased interest in person-to-person payment systems. Demand for simplified payment systems is at an all time high. On 6 December 2017, Apple announced Apple Pay Cash, a peer-to-peer payment system.
This announcement came just hours after news of a major heist in the cryptocurrency world that resulted in numerous people collectively losing over $50M in money. No doubt, consumers will be looking for more secure ways to exchange money with friends and family.
In the video below, that was posted on YouTube for Apple’s 5.6 million subscribers, the simple instructions leave out a very important step. The user must upgrade their device to Apple iOS 11.2 which adds the Apple Pay Cash capability. At present, over 75,000 people have watched the video and were likely perplexed by it since most people will not have performed the upgrade. Some older devices can’t be upgraded to iOS 11.2 so Apple Pay Cash won’t ever work on those devices.
To enjoy Apple Pay Cash, follow these steps:
- Go to Settings > General > Software Update
- Click Download and Install
- Enter your passcode
- Agree to the Terms and Conditions
- The update will download.
- Then the update will install.
- You’ll get a message “Verifying Update” and your device will restart.
- You’ll see the Apple logo with a progress bar.
- Once your device has restarted, then you should be able to follow the instructions provided in the video below.
- Whoever you send money to will also need to perform the above steps to get the money you send them.
Video
The Missing Announcement
An announcement on Apple’s website provides the missing information, but it should have been included at the introduction to the video or at the end.
Conclusion
After some initial confusion and possibly frustration, hopefully users will figure out what they need to do to make Apple Pay Cash work.
The release of a major product feature, with incomplete information is disconcerting, particularly just weeks after a major security vulnerability and oversight in Apple’s macOS High Sierra that required an emergency update to 10.13.1. That bug allowed anybody to gain full administrative super-user control over any Apple computer from the login screen. Another less significant oversight recently was the inability to easily enter numbers into their program called Numbers.
Let’s hope that Apple does a better job going forward in fully testing everything they are pushing out to the public.
Iowa City Technology Services 