My experience is that you can start the process by entering your credit card details, or use your camera to try fill them in for you.
Apple then checks if your card issuer has ApplePay enabled and if so provisions a “virtual” card which is what is stored on the device’s Secure Enclave.
I also just checked my banking app quickly which can initiate the adding of the card to wallet, showing the wallet’s add card screen with the card holder name and the last 4 digits and asking if you want to proceed.
There is no way to see what the full virtual card number is, so there is no way to use this virtual card aside from tapping your phone on CC machines or using websites which have set up ApplePay as a payment method.
CC machines don’t actually have to support ApplePay specifically, as long as it supports tap to pay without insisting on a PIN, then ApplePay works with it. In essence your phone’s NFC exactly implements the same capabilities and protocols as NFC chips on normal credit cards.
> CC machines don’t actually have to support ApplePay specifically, as long as it supports tap to pay without insisting on a PIN, then ApplePay works with it. In essence your phone’s NFC exactly implements the same capabilities and protocols as NFC chips on normal credit cards.
IIRC it's not exactly the same. One user-facing example where things are different is that contactless payments with a regular credit card have a 50 € maximum. If there is a limit when paying with the iPhone, it's much higher.
I also seem to recall that the merchant's payment contract must support this, but I'll have to confirm with a colleague. Although Apple Pay support is very common where I live, it did happen a few times that some restaurant's terminal accepted VISA contactless but not Apple Pay.
I've also had a situation where my CC is set up to not allow payments outside my country. Payment with Apple Pay was denied as being "out of country", whereas the physical card worked fine. The store is from a big national chain, in the heart of the capital city.
I’ve used ApplePay on CC machines which were clearly made before ApplePay even existed.
I’m pretty sure that the limit amount before PIN verification is required is embedded in the NFC, or checked online or something. Both my credit cards have limits of R500 (~26USD) after which it requires I enter my PIN after tapping it.
For one of my credit cards I’m able to pay it off with my other credit card and I have in the past tapped my iPhone to do so for payments over R50,000 (~2600USD), I don’t think there’s a limit.
However, the biggest grocery retail chain here initially had a very annoying “custom” rule on their CC machines where it would ignore the card limit and insist on asking for PIN for any payments over R500, which would cause ApplePay tap attempts to auto decline, they eventually fixed this.
The out of country issue sounds like a configuration issue with your bank or that particular merchant. My cards by default disallow use out of country and I’ve never had an issue tapping anywhere with ApplePay.
