UK Gov’t Now Accepts Apple Pay For Some Services

The U.K. government has now started accepting Apple Pay for certain online payment services.

9to5Mac reported that the government’s website is now accepting Apple Pay for four of its online services, including the Global Entry Services, the disclosure and barring service checks, the Registered Traveler Service, and the Electronic Visa Waiver Service. There are plans to expand Apple Pay support to the local government, police, and the NHS later this year.

Launched in 2016, the gov.uk website initially only accepted payments from credit and debit cards.

“Allowing people to pay for government services through Apple Pay and Google Pay means they won’t have to enter their credit or debit card information when making payments,” said Till Wirth, lead product manager of gov.uk Pay. “This innovation will increase the convenience and security of gov.uk Pay for users and hopefully make their experience online a lot easier.”

And Oliver Dowden, the U.K .minister for implementation, added that the launch of Apple Pay support to gov.uk will be able to reduce fraud, as well as make it easier for consumers to pay online.

“We’re focused on making access to government services as easy as possible. And introducing mobile payment to gov.uk Pay will also make transactions more secure,” he said. “This is another example of how we are working smarter as a government — improving services for people as well as reducing fraud and costs.”

The news comes after Apple launched Apple Card last month, a Mastercard that it partnered with Goldman Sachs to launch. The credit card has no fees and gives customers 2 percent cash back on purchases made with Apple Pay and 1 percent on purchases made with the credit card. Users sign up for the card with their iPhone in the Wallet App with the card ready in minutes, delivered straight to the iPhone.