In anticipation of Android Pay’s UK launch, MBNA has officially announced its support.
In a statement on its website, the company pointed to a rising trend of contactless payments in the country, which it said tripled last year to process a total of £7.75 billion. Android Pay will be a valuable component of that market, the bank suggested, and ahead of its release has already secured support at 460,000 locations in the UK.
In a statement, MBNA CEO Ian O’Doherty characterized the support as representative of his company’s tech-forward approach, asserting that MBNA customers “have a head start in accessing new payment technology as we join the first wave of card providers offering Android Pay in the UK, giving our customers greater choice and convenience in how they pay.”
The question, of course, remains over when exactly Android Pay will launch in the country. In a recent blog post, Google indicated that it would arrive “in the next few months,” but that could ultimately give Apple Pay a head start in the UK of about a year. Meanwhile, the other major mPayment rival, Samsung Pay, is also expected to make its UK debut this year, though in that case too no official launch date has been announced.
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