Ingenico has announced Google Pay Smart Tap integration for UK consumers with its payment terminals as part of a partnership between it and Google to make paying for goods and services even easier than it was before, thanks to enhanced functionality that will come along with the new integration. What this is going to mean for consumers is likely a better overall experience with the payment process during shopping as Google Pay Smart Tap allows for the use of loyalty cards, gift cards, and offers during the point of sale that have been saved to Google Pay.
This will be in addition to all Ingenico terminals already supporting NFC-based wallet services, such as Google Pay, and will simply be extending that payment method by enhancing the loyalty programs, which Ingenico is hoping the use of will be increased once this rolls out for consumers. The company believes that more consumers will be convinced to opt into loyalty programs now that the Google Pay Smart Tap integration will be in place, as all of the personal information that consumers may want to keep private can be entered into Google Pay before the point of sale, and from there all consumers will have to do is tap their phones over the terminal where they would normally swipe a credit or debit card and alleviate the need to enter any information at the terminal.
If consumer opt-in is increased then brand loyalty for retailers should also increase as consumers will have more of an incentive to use loyalty programs and gift cards, both of which bring consumers back to those locations through the use of special rewards for shopping more with the brand. Ingenico is only rolling this out in the UK for the time being but it is expected to roll out to other regions in the future, though it did not mention any sort of time frame for the roll out to countries outside of the UK so the expansion could still be further out. Google Pay is Google’s re-branding of Android Pay which the company just recently started rolling out to users a little bit earlier this month.