Following the service’s launch in India earlier this year, Samsung has now announced that Samsung Pay now allows the use of SBI debit cards in the country. To entice users who may have been left out prior to support for the bank’s cards being added, the company has also revealed a cashback offer for all SBI users who add their account to Samsung Pay. The offer is available until August 31, and users will earn Rs. 100 for every Rs. 500 spent through the app – with a maximum of Rs. 500 (or just short of $8 USD) that can be earned.
Samsung Pay already supported both NFC and MST, as well as working with UPI and Paytm, so Samsung probably hasn’t had any trouble getting residents of the country to try the app out, already. That’s especially true since Samsung claims to have managed to capture a remarkable 25 percent of the smartphone market. Meanwhile, SBI says that a total of 130 million customers make use of its debit cards. Unfortunately, despite SBI’s claim that adding the support will increase the number of payments it processes by up to 20 times, it has also stated that the company’s Maestro cards will not see Samsung Pay yet. The new cards will not receive support until at least December of 2018. That’s down to the rate at which current cards are being replaced, according to SBI. Nevertheless, the partnership and promotion should provide Samsung’s service with a substantial boost in terms of Samsung Pay users.
Perhaps unsurprisingly, the use of Samsung Pay in India will also be helped by its availability on devices across each of the Android price ranges. The app is, of course, supported on high-end devices from this year and last. But previous flagships are also supported – including the Galaxy S6 Edge+ and the Galaxy Note 5. Beyond that, Samsung’s Galaxy A5 and Galaxy A7 from both 2016 and 2017 support Samsung Pay, in addition to the Galaxy A9 Pro. Furthermore, owners of the recently released Galaxy J7 Pro can also take advantage of both the app and the offer. There have also been reports that Samsung will soon open up its mobile wallet app to third-party devices. With that said, the inclusion of SBI’s debit cards should be welcome news for customers that may have been forced to hold out on giving Samsung Pay a try.