Today I went on a journey to find a Taiwanese bank that supports Google Pay on their debit cards.
Chang Hwa Bank - 彰化銀行
This is the bank where I get paid at the moment. They gave me a visa debit card when opening an account and their online banking is very dated but has English.
After lots of explaining and finding the few people in the bank who had a clue, it was a miss. CHB only has Google Pay on their credit cards! (debit cards usually work just fine with Google Pay)
Of course a foreigner has to put down a deposit as high as the limit you want to have to get a credit card (basically defying the purpose of a credit card)
The woman felt bad as she understood how shitty their policies are, but could not do anything.
Chunghwa Post - 中華郵政全球資訊網
Previous employer paid to that bank. They give Visa debit card when opening an account.
They only support Taiwan Pay (台灣Pay)
Mega International Commercial Bank - 兆豐國際商業銀行
The very first bank I used in Taiwan.
Their ATM’s support many financial networks. So even very basic bank cards from Europe worked fine.
They do not support Google Pay and the employee recommended to try Cathay United Bank!
Cathay United Bank - 國泰世華銀行
They made a new account for me and issued a visa debit card that works with Google Pay and supports contact-less payments. I have to wait a week because my account has just been set up, but then it should work fine. Success!
I was able to verify my Cathay United Bank debit card with Google Pay
I like their online banking. It is in English and modern.
The only drawback so far is their Android app, only in Chinese. Luckily it does not block screenshots, so I can use Google Translate to translate Chinese text from the screenshots.
They have tons of credit cards with different rewards. I did not apply for one as I don’t need one. Probably will have same issues as other banks as an ARC holder.
What’s so special about a debit card working with Google pay? I used my SC issued debit card with apple pay and it works fine. The contactless part is from the phone’s NFC, not the card. So I’m curious to know whats special about a debit card + google pay?
The idea behind it is safety. Debit cards have much fewer protections against fraud than credit cards. Card skimmers are a big problem especially when overseas.
When paying with Google Pay using your phone’s NFC, you real credit card number is never used in a transaction. So a compromised terminal can not steal your information or double charge.
AFAIK This is also the case for Apple Pay.
correct. But it has nothing to do with the debit card per se. Any debit card will/should do. What I was asking is related to what you wrote: “issued a visa debit card that works with Google Pay and supports contact-less payments” - any card should work. What’s special about Google pay that you have to specifically ask for this?
Only certain banks and cards work with Google Pay, since the bank has to share their fees with Google. This is why many banks, if they support Google Pay, will only support it for credit cards, since their margins are higher than for debit cards.
The bank has to support it. There must be a bank server that talks to Google services and authenticates the customers.
In case of Cathay United Bank I got a verification code to my phone number associated with my account. I had to use that code to verify my card on Google Pay.
My German bank has this verification process embedded into their banking app.
Without those steps the normal debit card number will be used in the transaction (or can not be used at all? never tried it). The whole point was not to use the debit card number during transactions for safety. And this only works with banks that directly support Google Pay.
Some banks refuse and do their own payment app not to share fees with Google/Apple as mentioned by @ma3xiu1
Does anyone know for the premier accounts, do you have to have the 3 million NT$ (or equivalent) in both the Taiwan account and the original country account?
OK thank you very much. Follow up question: Usually, how much is the international wire transfer fee? Is it substantial enough to make a $30 USD payment not worth it?
Yes. The fees are composed of several sub-items, some of which are fixed and others a % of the amount you want to transfer. BOT charged me NT$560 the last time for a US$15,000 transfer and I think it won’t be much cheaper if you transfer US$30.
Nope, there is quite a process actually behind in supporting a mobile wallet. It takes to support tokenisation services with the network, fraud rules with the mobile wallet, marketing commitments, revenue sharing, virtualised card design approvals.
So, not every bank supports them, and among those who support them not all cards are supported.
