Samsung Pay Now Supports SBI Debit Cards as Well

Samsung and SBI have announced Samsung Pay support for SBI debit cards to expand the benefits of digital payments to more smartphone users in India. Higher variants of SBI debit cards are now supported on Samsung Pay, and the company has even announced an inaugural offer rewarding maximum cashback of Rs. 500.

SBI cards are now supported on all Samsung devices that feature Samsung Pay. Samsung and SBI announced this development at an event in Mumbai, where SBI claimed to have 130 million customers using their debit cards. Furthermore, Samsung claims that 25 percent of the smartphone market in India is held by Samsung. Together, the companies see huge potential in digitalising payments across the country.

Speaking at the event, a SBI spokesperson claims that the company expects 10- 20 times increase in payments through the support of Samsung Pay. The company also claims that Samsung Pay won't be supported with Maestro cards, and that support should arrive by December 2018, after all the cards are replaced.

As part of the inaugural offer, all SBI debit card consumers will get Rs. 100 cashback on a minimum purchase of Rs. 500 using Samsung Pay. A maximum cashback of Rs. 500 can be availed till August 31, after which the offer does not stand valid.

The Samsung Pay mobile payments platform was launched in India in March this year, and apart from several banks, it works with UPI, and Paytm as well. Samsung Pay supports both NFC and MST (Magnetic Secure Transmission) that allows a user to send a magnetic signal from smartphone to the payment terminal's card reader.

Alongside, Samsung announced that the NFC supporting Samsung Galaxy J7 Pro, which was launched in the country in June, has now gone on sale, and also supports Samsung Pay - thus, it has SBI debit card support as well. 

"Both Samsung and SBI are household names in India, and it is a momentous occasion for us to collaborate on Samsung Pay and extend an innovative solution that is transforming people's lives worldwide. Samsung Pay, with its many 'Make for India' innovations, is revolutionising the way people carry out their day-to-day payments and transactions. To help more consumers avail of our innovative payment system, we have also introduced Samsung Pay to our mid-segment smartphones like Samsung Galaxy J7 Pro. We recently introduced Samsung Pay Mini to cater to the unique requirement of the mid-segment customers too," Asim Warsi, Sr Vice President, Mobile Business, Samsung India said in a statement.

For now, Samsung Pay is available on the Galaxy S8, Galaxy S8+, Galaxy S7 Edge, Galaxy S7, Galaxy Note 5, Galaxy S6 Edge+, Galaxy A5 (2016), Galaxy A7 (2016), Galaxy A5 (2017), Galaxy A7 (2017), Galaxy A9 Pro, and the newly launched Galaxy J7 Pro.