In today’s edition of companies making it all too easy for us to spend money, Barclays has added a feature to its iOS app that will debit your account after hearing you utter but a few words. Or, less sinisterly put, Barclays’ mobile banking app now lets you make payments with Siri commands. Provided you’ve granted Apple’s assistant access to your account in the app, you can transfer money to any previously known payee, or anyone in your iPhone’s contact list. And you needn’t worry about that annoying friend saying “Hey Siri, pay Jamie £15 with Barclays,” as you still need to tap your finger to the Touch ID sensor to confirm the transfer.
Siri integration has been live in the app for a few days now, and is meant for smaller payments like your share of the dinner bill, with single transfer and daily limits to keep spending in check. Barclays boasts it’s the first UK high street bank to enable Siri payments. That’s technically true, though PayPal added the feature towards the end of last year and Santander added voice payments to its app in February, though it’s not Siri you’re asking in that instance. Siri’s able to take on new tasks such as making payments thanks to Apple finally allowing other apps to talk to the assistant from last summer. And given what Google said earlier this year, its voice assistant isn’t too far from acquiring a similar skillset.
Source: Barclays (1), (2)
