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Walgreens becomes first retailer to merge Apple Pay with rewards card systems

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You may love or hate Walgreens, but they’re now the first to offer a rewards program via Apple Pay.

Walgreens announced on Thursday that the pharmacy chain has begun running its rewards program via Apple Pay. The company has long supported this through QR codes, but can now do this through NFC thanks to features in iOS 9.

In addition to Walgreens turning on support for its Balance Rewards card through Apple Pay, Kohl’s recently became the first retailer to enable its store credit card for use with Apple Pay. Apple also added more than 50 banks to work with Apple Pay this week.


New locations including Starbucks, KFC, and Chili’s will start accepting the mobile payment over the next few months. Canada and Australia will also gain Apple Pay this year through a deal with American Express in either country with Spain, Singapore and Hong Kong planned for 2016.

Apple Pay for reward cards works with iPhone 6, 6 Plus, 6s, and 6s Plus as well any Apple Watch running iOS 9 or later or watchOS.

If you’ve had a chance to try Apple Pay with the rewards card at Walgreens, let us know how it went and what you make of it in the comments.

Via 9to5Mac

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