SYDNEY, Dec 16 (Reuters) - Major Australian financial institutions including Westpac Banking Corp WBC.AX , ANZ Banking Group ANZ.AX and Macquarie MQG.AX will accept contactless payments via Android smart phones when Google GOOGL.O rolls out the service in 2016.
Android Pay, which competes with Apple Inc's AAPL.O Apple Pay in the mobile payments market, will be available at major Australian retailers such as Wesfarmers' Coles WES.AX , Domino's Pizza DMP.AX , McDonald's (N:MCD) MCD.N and Telstra TLS.AX , Pali Bhat, director of product management at Google wrote in a blog post.
This comes at a time when Apple has been struggling to persuade Australia's big banks to sign up for its mobile payment system since its launch last month.
Android Pay arrives in Australia in the first half of 2016 and will support both MasterCard and Visa credit and debit cards, Bhat wrote.