Commonwealth Bank of Australia has teased the nation's first NFC payment service for iPhones, getting around the lack of an integrated NFC chip by including one in an accompanying phone cover.
Australia's incumbent bank revealed its new Kaching service will be launched “in the coming months.”
It will support POS payments through MasterCard PayPass terminals, as well as mobile-to-mobile or mobile-to-email payments, and bill payment service BPAY.
Peer transfers can be made through contact lists, or - in what the bank claims is a world first - to a user's Facebook friends list.
Transactions will be protected by a four-digit pin, and the bank said the app does not store any banking data on the phone itself.
Kaching will also provide tools to enable Commonwealth Bank customers to access information about their accounts and transfer money between them.
The compay has developed a video to promote the service.
The initial announcement only mentioned an iOS version, leading some customers to question the lack of an Android version.
But Commonwealth Bank has subsequently clarified that an Android version is also in the works, which should be launching at around the same time.