Apple Pay goes live

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Courtesy of Apple

Apple rolled out its new way to pay on all devices running iOS 8.1 this Monday. The service covers a variety of stores and credit cards and works by simply taking a picture of a credit card to save it to the Passbook app.

Have you, or a loved one, experienced chronic frustration at having to dig through a wallet or purse for credit cards at the checkout counter?

If so, talk to your friendly Apple store Genius about Apple Pay.

The Cupertino tech company rolled out its new way to pay at retail stores with an iPhone 6, iPad Air 2, or iWatch this Monday. Apple Pay allows customers to link most major credit cards with new iDevices and pay at Near Field Communications (NFC) enabled terminals in stores.

Apple claims the product saves time at the checkout counter by eliminating the hassle of fumbling around for physical cards. Owners of the new iPhone 6 or iPad Air 2 running iOS 8.1 can simply take a picture of a credit card to save it into the Passbook app. From there, they can simply hold the phone near an NFC terminal and touch the home button to authenticate payments with a thumbprint.

Credit and debit cards from Visa, Mastercard, and American Express, among 500 others, can all be used with Apple Pay, covering 83 percent of the purchased credit cards in the U.S. Users can pay at stores ranging from Walgreens to Toys R’ Us and McDonalds using the new payment method, as well as make purchases in the iTunes store on an iDevice.

To enforce security, Apple doesn’t collect purchase history, and does not store credit card numbers directly. All secure information is separate from iOS and is not stored on iCloud, with transactions performed between merchants and the user’s banks.

Zabin Bashar (12) expressed concern about the security about storing credit card information in the cloud.

“While Apple Pay is extremely convenient and simple, I think there will always be some fear with keeping such important information online securely, especially in light of the recent iCloud hackings,” Zabin said.

Apple Pay side effects may include credit card ennui and a general distaste for rectangular pieces of plastic.