RIP Semble
Semble, a New Zealand mobile wallet company, has today announced that following a strategic review of the business it will discontinue its current mobile payment service.
Semble was great when retailers I went to had payWave. However, there are still many retailers which don’t support contactless payments to date. It is this reason why Semble has decided to shut down its mobile payment service.
“Mobile payment services haven’t had the speed of uptake and usage we expected due to a variety of reasons. These include low levels of consumer awareness of mobile payments and relatively low volumes of contactless terminals, especially outside the major retail brands, although contactless transactions in general are growing,” CEO of Semble, Rob Ellis, said.
Semble was an exciting project when it first started, as it hoped to uptake the use of mobile payments in New Zealand. Unfortunately, this is still not the case. The only two banks that partnered with Semble were ASB and BNZ. Now banks are introducing their own mobile wallet, such as ASB Virtual. BNZ have said they will be introducing their own mobile wallet very soon.
Semble have said that you can continue to use Semble-loaded cards until mid-August, while Snapper have said they will cease support from the 25th of August 2016. However, you can still use Snapper on your phone provided you have turned the card ON in Semble.
In the meantime, I will continue to use ASB Virtual to pay with my phone, wherever payWave is accepted.
