[NewsPoster]

Ask anyone who uses Apple Pay, and you will get a familiar refrain: they love it, they use it everywhere they can, they actively seek out and give their business to merchants who support it, it is the future. However, a new study suggests that growth of use of the feature is declining, mostly due to a lack of rapid uptake by businesses, who lack the technology to offer support. That is slowly changing, however, with Asian restaurant chain Pei Wei and St. Louis grocery stores now supporting Apple Pay as an option.

InfoSout says that use of Apple Pay dropped among iPhone 6 or 6 Plus users from March to June, from 15 percent to 13 percent. Despite the enormous popularity in the US of the iPhone 6 models, later buyers appear to be getting the iPhone for other reasons, with Apple Pay not as much of a priority as it was with early adopters. Moreover, newer buyers seem to be less aware that the feature exists at all, or how it works.

In its survey, respondents who said that they had not tried Apple Pay because they hadn't added their cards or for other reasons increased from 31 percent to 34 percent. Unfounded but understandable security concerns about the technology seems to be a leading reason for reluctance to try it, and was cited by 19 percent of those surveyed in June, compared to 15 percent in March. In fact, Apple Pay is far more secure than any other payment method, since card information is not available on the device, and the entire transaction is kept private and encrypted -- unlike payments made with cards directly.

Four percent of users said that they use it less or not at all anymore because of poor experiences in getting it to work. Another factor noted by InfoScout is that the US, unlike most other advanced countries, is well behind the rest of the world in chin-and-PIN payment cards, and availability of contactless terminals that support NFC and specifically Apple Pay -- a problems Apple's rivals, such as Google Wallet, have also run into.

The technology is still, however, the most popular touchless and mobile payment solution in the US, with more than 90 percent of all banks supporting it, and participating institutions now up to around 465 partners. Apple and individual companies have made periodic announcements of new chains or companies accepting the payments, with the latest coming from Asian restaurant chain Pei Wei, which now supports the technology at all of its outlets.

In addition, Schnucks and Dierbergs Markets -- two large grocery-store chains in the St. Louis Missouri area -- are now accepting Apple Pay at registers, following in the footsteps of other grocery chains such as Whole Foods. Popular alternative chain Trader Joe's has announced support, but has not yet implemented it, and other retailers such as Best Buy have plans to update to support the technology later this year, but do not presently support it.

As newer cards (required by merchants beginning in the fall) and more contactless terminals get installed, the public at large will likely start using "tap to pay" technology more widely, and more merchants will offer it either explicitly or silently, since Apple Pay generally works on NFC contactless terminals even without direct merchant support. Once Apple Pay is available in more countries, adoption will likely soar due to consumers in those areas already having been long used to such terminals.

[pairof9s]

Another note of concern is that many Apple Pay merchants require additional input (PIN, Cash back, etc) that normally accompanies debit/credit card usage. This includes merchants who did not initially request such input. The "convenience" is greatly diminished if you still need to provide such info.

[pottymouth]

I'd love to try it. Citizen's Bank can go %&(* themselves.

[Makosuke]

I use ApplePay anywhere that I shop that supports it (and have actively avoided shopping at CVS since they installed NFC terminals with ApplePay disabled), but it just isn't available most places I currently shop.

My local supermarket just installed terminals that apparently have NFC in them, but thus far they haven't enabled the feature at all, which is pretty annoying, and my hardware store just got brand new terminals that apparently don't have NFC at all. I'm hoping that as more businesses upgrade it'll eventually do a sort of silent rollout to the places I shop.

Aside: I'm willing to accept that most places I've used it thus far still require a signature as well, but given that the dang thing has already scanned and confirmed my fingerprint, it'd be nice for them to get with the program and skip that already-pointless step.

[davoud]

I tried it twice. In both instances there were more steps involved than if I had pulled my debit card out of my wallet, swiped it, and entered my PIN. Whether that's poor implementation by the particular retailers or a typical experience, I do not know. I do know, however, that I won't use Apple Pay again until I hear that it is wave-and-walk everywhere.

[Charles Martin]

davoud: that's definitely the retailer, I believe. I don't have an iPhone 6 so I haven't tried it personally, but I've been in the company of a friend with one, and we went to lunch at a Panera Bread. He took the phone out of his pocket, wallet came up by itself, he tapped it, and that was that.

Someday, every place will work like that. But it was an impressive glimpse into the future.