One of the slight criticisms raised about Apple Pay when using the cashless system to commute is that it takes a fraction longer at the ticket barriers than swiping your Oyster card.
But this issue can easily be fixed, or rather avoided altogether, by "pre-arming" Apple Pay our your iPhone -- an underreported but neat little feature buried within Apple Pay.
It is possible to pre-authorise your Apple Pay account before you get to any payment terminal -- including ticket barriers -- so there is no need to scan your fingerprint ID while others wait impatiently behind you.
The pre-arm function itself is not flagged up within Passbook, so it is easy to miss this handy extra ability. But here's how you do it:
- Open Passbook
- Select the card you wish to pay with
- Touch the fingerprint scanner and the card will begin to identify you and pre-authorise the chosen card
- You then have 60 seconds to pay using the iPhone -- without the need to scan your finger again
After the 60 seconds has elapsed, the pre-arming cancels to maintain the payment system's security.
This function is not available on Apple Watch, but this is because it is effectively already pre-armed thanks to the in-built identification on the device.
This article was originally published by WIRED UK
