From an iPhone, a Watch or Safari
Apple Pay Betting
Instant in, about 6 minutes out, and no card number typed anywhere. Worth knowing that Apple Pay is a wrapper around a card rather than an account of its own.
Apple Pay is the quickest thing to use and the easiest to misunderstand. It is not a payment account with a balance; it is a way of presenting a card you already hold without exposing the number. Everything about how it behaves follows from that.
Where it appears
In the LadBet app and in Safari on an Apple device. It does not appear in Chrome or Firefox, even on an iPhone, and it does not appear on Android at all.
Why the browser matters
Apple Pay on the web is available only to Safari. That is Apple’s restriction rather than ours, and there is nothing we can implement to change it. Anybody who uses Chrome on an iPhone by habit will simply not see the option, which accounts for most of the queries about it having disappeared.
Apple Watch
Works where the app supports it, which for us means confirming a deposit already started on a paired iPhone rather than initiating one from the wrist. The authentication is the watch’s own, and it counts as strong authentication in the same way Face ID does.
The card behind it
This is the detail that decides whether a payment will work, and the Apple Pay interface hides it.
It must be a debit card
Apple Pay presents whichever card is selected in Wallet. If that card is a credit card, the deposit is declined for exactly the same legal reason a credit card is declined directly. The fix is to switch the default card in Wallet or to select a different one at the point of payment, and it is not obvious from the error message.
It must be in your name
A card added to somebody else’s Wallet is still their card. The name rule applies unchanged, and a device belonging to you does not make a card belonging to your partner acceptable.
Paying in and getting paid
In, immediately. Out, about 6 minutes in the median case.
Where a withdrawal actually goes
To the card behind Apple Pay, not to Apple. That means the receiving bank’s posting behaviour applies just as it does to a direct card withdrawal: the money shows in Wallet before it shows on the statement, and the gap between those two is the bank rather than us.
Why it is a little faster than a card
Tokenised payments carry cleaner authentication data, so fewer transactions stop for manual review. The difference is small — a few minutes on a median — and it disappears entirely if the receiving bank batches gambling credits overnight.
Setting it up
Nothing to do at our end; it is entirely a device arrangement.
On the device
Add a debit card to Wallet on the iPhone, which requires confirming it with the issuing bank once. From then on it is available at our cashier without anything further. If you hold several cards, the default in Wallet is the one offered first and it can be changed at the point of payment by tapping the card shown.
Why it sometimes vanishes
Three causes: the browser is not Safari, the only card in Wallet is a credit card, or the device has no cards added at all. None of the three produces a helpful message, and all three are resolved on the phone rather than in the account.
Apple Pay and limits
One interaction worth knowing about, since the payment is quicker than any other and that is precisely the point.
A deposit that takes two seconds and a fingerprint is materially easier to make than one requiring a card number and a banking app prompt, and the difference shows up in how often people deposit rather than in how much. Any deposit limit you have set applies to Apple Pay exactly as to everything else, which is the sensible counterweight. If Apple Pay is your main method, a daily limit is worth more here than on a slower route.
Security
The genuine advantage of Apple Pay, and it is worth stating what it does and does not protect.
What it does
The card number is never sent to us. What travels is a device-specific token plus a one-time cryptogram, which is useless if intercepted and cannot be replayed. Combined with Face ID or a passcode on every payment, it is the most secure method on the cashier by a clear margin.
What it does not
It does not stop somebody with your unlocked phone from depositing, and it does not put a limit on spending. Those are what deposit limits are for, and a payment method being secure is a separate question from a session being controlled.
Play at a stake you would happily repeat next Saturday. Somebody will answer on 0808 8020 133, free of charge, at any hour you ring it. Anyone under 18 is outside the rules here.
Common questions
Why can I not see Apple Pay?
It appears only in our app and in Safari. Chrome and Firefox on an iPhone do not support it, and it is unavailable on Android.
How fast is an Apple Pay withdrawal?
About 6 minutes to the card behind it. The bank behind that card decides when it posts to a statement.
My Apple Pay deposit was declined.
Usually the selected card in Wallet is a credit card, which is refused by law. Switching to a debit card at the point of payment resolves it.
Is Apple Pay safer than a card?
On the payment itself, yes. The card number never reaches us and the token cannot be replayed. It does not limit how much is spent — that is what deposit limits are for.
Can I use a card in somebody else’s name?
No. The name rule applies to the card behind Apple Pay regardless of whose device it sits on.