Samsung has recently revealed that its Samsung Pay service will allow you to withdraw cash from ATM machines, but the service is currently limited.
To benefit from the feature, three criteria must be met: you should be in South Korea, you should own one of Samsung's flagships and you should use Woori Bank for the cash withdrawal.
Should all three conditions be met, no debit card will be needed to take cash out of ATMs in the country.
A Samsung executive from the Samsung Pay team noted at a recent developer conference that the company aims to take its mobile payments service to the UK, Spain, Singapore, Canada, Brazil and Australia during 2016. Currently, Samsung Pay works only in South Korea, China and the United States.
South Korean users of the service also get support for gift cards that let them redeem points useful to unlock rewards and special benefits. Via Samsung Pay, users in South Korea are able to operate online payments and shop on apps directly from their screen. During the conference, Samsung mentioned that it is unknown when these features will land in the U.S.
Samsung took the lid off its mobile payment service in 2015, allowing users of its flagship phones to purchase goods and services by sweeping the devices near registers instead of credit cards. The unveiling happened simultaneously with the presentation of Galaxy S6 and Galaxy S6 edge, the first handsets that supported the capability.
The possibility to take out cash from ATMs by using your smartphone is not breaking ground, but we commend Samsung for finally putting it into practice. The OEM did not divulge what technology it uses to make it happen, but we are looking at either NFC or MST.
Samsung is now one of the big players in the mobile payment technologies, but the company took its time before joining in the bandwagon. Apple was the first company to create hype around the functionality with the Apple Pay service, and Samsung followed.
As an interesting detail, both Apple and Samsung launched their mobile payment services in China at the same time, during the Chinese New Year. Since then, both companies have been looking to expand their services by adding features and setting foot in different markets.
