Huawei Pay launches in South Africa this week, with Zapper

Huawei Pay, a payments system for Huawei smartphone users, will be launched in South Africa later this week, the Chinese consumer electronics giant said on Monday.

The product, which is being launched in partnership with local payments company Zapper, will be available from Thursday, 3 December. Users will have to download the Huawei Wallet app from the Huawei AppGallery if they don’t already have it installed on their devices.

Huawei users will install an app and add their bank cards. Then, when paying in stores, they simply scan the Zapper QR payment code on the bill at checkout. All local debit and credit cards from all local banks are supported.

“Huawei Pay is secure: Every transaction has to be authenticated by your passcode or fingerprint and Huawei Pay receives the same fraud protection as you get on your bank cards,” Huawei said in a statement.

“In addition, Huawei Pay doesn’t use your bank card number to handle transactions — it isn’t stored on your device or on Huawei Pay servers, and is not shared with merchants. Your information is also kept private, as Huawei does not keep the transaction details.”

It appears that Huawei Pay does not yet support tap-to-pay functionality — TechCentral has asked Huawei if and when it plans to roll out this feature on its phones in South Africa.

Samsung Pay, from Huawei rival Samsung Electronics, has been available in South Africa for the past two years and supports tap to pay. Apple Pay, designed by Apple for iPhones, has not yet been launched in the local market.  — (c) 2020 NewsCentral Media