Apple Card: 7 Apple Credit Card Questions and Answers

Last March 25th, the Apple hosted a event's audience in which he presented a series of novelties in services, involving from games to magazines and TV shows. However, the most unexpected announcement and one that has generated many discussions was the company's entry into the credit card market with the Apple Card.

For a Brazilian consumer, the news of Apple Card are not very impressive, as they are quite similar to what is already offered by fintechs national like the Nubank.

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But it is good to remember that, at least for now, the credit card of Apple will only be released in the United States, which has a different financial ecosystem than ours.

Furthermore, what is clear is that the main objective of the company with the creation of the Apple Card is to accelerate the adoption of the payment platform Apple Pay, which is currently accepted by around 70% of American establishments.

What is Apple Card?

O Apple Card is a credit card developed by Apple in partnership with the American investment bank Goldman Sachs and MasterCard.

The card was created to complement the payment service Apple Pay and will be stored inside the application Wallet, which is pre-installed on all iPhones.

And on Wallet that all operations related to the Apple Card will be carried out, from requesting the card, using it for payments, consulting the limit, extracting and even paying the invoice.

How do I use Apple Card?

The first step in using the Apple Card is to make the request through the application Wallet. According to Apple the registration process is much simpler than that of a traditional credit card and you can make purchases in a few minutes, as long as your credit has been approved.

The complete credit approval process has not yet been disclosed, but it is known that it will be carried out by the Goldman Sachs and will take into account thecredit score” user, American equivalent to Positive Registration.

After approval, the Apple Card can be used like any other credit card linked to the Apple Pay. Just select it in the app Wallet, approach the iPhone of the reader and authenticate using the Face ID or Touch ID to make the payment.

The card number, expiry date and CVV are available at Wallet so that they can be used for online purchases. You can discard this information and generate a new card at any time. If the purchase is made within the Safari browser, this data will be automatically filled in the fields of the payment form.

Is the card only virtual?

Not. THE Apple know that not all establishments have machines with NFC and accept Apple Pay, so the company also created a luxurious physical card for use in older terminals.

Made of titanium, the Apple Card physical has an extremely clean design. On the front, there are only the name of the cardholder, the Apple logo (engraved in laser) and the chip. On the back are the magnetic strip and the logos of the Goldman Sachs and the Mastercard.

To consult the card number and the CVV, it is necessary to open the Wallet No. iPhone. Not having this information pinned in, in addition to making the design more attractive, serves as an additional security measure.

O Apple Card physical does not support payments via NFC, that is, it is necessary to enter it in the machines for reading. But if you want to pay via NFC, just use your iPhone.

What are the benefits?

Unlike most traditional credit cards, the Apple Card does not have a points program, but offers part of the money back when it is used in a purchase, the so-called cashback.

The fee of cashback varies from 1% to 3%. for shopping with Apple Card in commercial establishments via Apple Pay, the cardholder receives 2% of the value back. for shopping with Apple Card in stores and services Apple , including signatures from the Apple Music and games in App Store, 3% are returned. Finally, when using Apple Card physical, you gain 1% of cashback.

While several other cards offer cashback in the USA, even in more attractive quantities, one of the differentials of the Apple Card is that the money is returned daily – which Apple call of Daily Cash – and not just at the end of the month, for example.

The company also guarantees that it will in no way charge fees and annuities from customers. Apple Card. Among the cited examples of exemption from fees by the Apple late payment penalties and international fees.

A Apple states that it will charge lower interest rates than the average, between 13,24% and 24,24% (depending on the user's credit rating), but according to experts these fees are nothing exceptional and are applied by several competing cards.

How do I view the Apple Card statement?

In-app Wallet. Apple developed a specific section in the app that displays, in a simple and intuitive way, the expenses made with the Apple Card.

The company uses the Apple Maps e machine learning algorithm to identify the name, address and category of merchants, which makes it easier for the cardholder to remember where a purchase was made.

A Wallet It also automatically sorts spending between categories like “Food”, “Transport”, “Entertainment”, etc. so that the user can know their profile and consumption trends.

The invoice payment interface is designed to encourage the user to pay off as much debt as possible and avoid paying interest. Just drag your finger over the ring and the app calculates interest and the total invoice amount in real time.

For example, if the invoice total is BRL 1000 and the user tries to pay only BRL 700, the app immediately informs you how much interest this could incur in future interest, which in theory will induce the consumer to pay the full amount.

Is Apple Card safe?

According to Apple , much. The focus on security and privacy was constantly raised during the presentation of the Apple Card and even received a special section on the product's website.

To start, the number and other card data are generated in the iPhone and stored in Secure Elementt, a chip designed to store payment data isolated from the operating system.

A Apple also generates an individual security code for each transaction made with the Apple Card and requires authentication via Face ID ou touch ID before each purchase. These measures make it difficult to steal card data.

A Apple also claims not to be able to see what was purchased or how much the transactions made with the Apple Card, as all processing is performed locally on the iPhone itself and no information is sent to the company's servers.

The bank Goldman Sachs, however, has access to this data, but undertakes not to share it for marketing and advertising purposes.

How do I order my Apple Card?

If you live in Brazil, you will not be able to request a Apple Card so early. The card arrives on the American market during the northern hemisphere summer (between June and September), but there was no mention by the Apple regarding the release in other countries.

In an interview this week with the broadcaster CNBC, the CEO of Goldman Sachs stated that after the availability of the Apple Card in the US, the bank will start thinking about international opportunities, but initially in Europe.