So I’ve been using my PAY for 10 days now. I’ve tried out a bunch of readers and most have worked pretty effortlessly. The ones with no screen, or where the reader is mounted above the screen seem to work best. The only two I haven’t been able to fully figure out yet are:
Verifone MX 915
Ingenico iSC Touch 250
There are two issues with these type of reader.
- The antenna is located behind the LCD display. There’s likely some ferrite waveguides built into their construction which makes the coupling position very specific. It’s optimized for you to place a card right over the screen. You can definitely get it to work with some practice, though.
- The NFC functionality of these readers timeout after ~30 seconds, but nothing visually changes on the display. To re-activate the field, the clerk needs to initiate the payment process again.
Needless to say hunting for the correct position can sometimes frustrate store clerks, especially when they don’t know what you’re trying to do or don’t believe that you have an implant. I’ve been taking a DT diagnostic card with me when I try out readers for the first time to make the whole process easier. It also makes you seem more legitimate to incredulous clerks.
After you figure out the positioning for the readers you commonly encounter it’s very liberating having payment in the palm of your hand (or wherever)