With the feature finally rolled out in the city state in Dec 2025, iPhones have been added to HitPay’s payment network.
For many small and mobile-based enterprises across Singapore, digital payment acceptance once meant maintaining separate terminals and data connections: an expensive and often impractical task for vendors that sell at markets or in the field.
In December 2025, a group of these small business operators began testing a software-only point-of-sale (POS) capability to accept contactless payments directly on iPhones, thereby removing the cost and logistical friction of carrying dedicated in-store hardware.
The change addresses persistent challenges these businesses had faced for years: limited mobility, delayed onboarding of payment systems, and dependency on third-party card readers. The rollout provides a way to accept payments securely without additional terminals while complying with local financial regulations.
Among the technical measures implemented were:
- Usage of near-field communications technology rolled out on 2 Dec 2025 (in Singapore) in iPhones’ Tap to Pay feature; as well as via existing Android smart devices supporting Tap to Pay since 2023
- Encrypted on-device data handling, ensuring neither merchants nor the platform store card details or transaction histories externally
- Integrated software frameworks that automatically synchronize sales data with existing business management systems
- Accessibility features supporting secure PIN entry for customers when required
In addition, the payment platform is regulated by the Monetary Authority of Singapore, Bank Negara Malaysia, Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas, AUSTRAC, and FinCEN, and thereby potentially reachable to other countries in the region and beyond.
Such improvements enabled Singapore enterprises — ranging from food vendors to independent service providers — to begin transacting digitally within minutes instead of days. For the beneficiaries of this platform, the ability to complete transactions directly through customers’ Android and iPhone smart devices has made it simpler to reach more customers without setup delays or extra hardware.
Explaining the impact of the rollout, Aditya Haripurkar, Chief Executive Officer, HitPay, the payments platform vendor, said the initiative illustrates how “software-driven payment capabilities are redefining traditional merchant infrastructure” by allowing small enterprises to run cashless operations from everyday devices.
