It was made public over the weekend that Switzerland’s Competition Commission (COMCO) had launched an investigation into several Swiss financial institutions. The object of this investigation is a suspected boycott of mobile payment solutions from international providers such as Apple Pay and Samsung Pay.

The investigation is aimed at clarifying whether several Swiss financial institutions have reached an agreement to boycott mobile payment solutions of international providers such as Apple Pay and Samsung Pay. Several Swiss financial institutions are suspected of having jointly agreed not to enable their credit cards for use with Apple Pay and Samsung Pay, in order to protect TWINT, their own Swiss payment solution.

The investigation has been launched against: Aduno Holding AG, Credit Suisse (Switzerland) AG, PostFinance AG, Swisscard AECS GmbH, UBS Switzerland AG. COMCO carried out on-site inspections at the premises of the target companies.

On another front, COMCO published a press release today concerning their work with Apple in resolving a problem with Apple Pay

COMCO stated that "The automatic launch of Apple Pay at POS terminals can interfere with payments made by the TWINT application. Following the intervention of the COMCO Secretariat, Apple is committed to offering a pro-competitive technical solution.

Apple offers with Apple Pay a mobile payment solution for its devices, in particular the iPhone and Apple Watch. Apple devices and their apps are set to launch Apple Pay automatically when held close to a POS terminal to allow a contactless payment.

Payments with the TWINT application are effectuated by scanning a QR-code that appears on the screen of the POS terminal. Until now, Apple Pay was likely to launch automatically and thus disrupt a current payment transaction made with the TWINT App.

Apple has committed to immediately provide a technical solution enabling TWINT to suppress Apple Pay during the payment transaction effectuated with TWINT. Due to these commit-ments, the secretariat decided to close the preliminary investigation against Apple."

In the end, Apple Pay has been hated and feared by many financial institutions. Two years ago the Australian Bank Cartel was denied the ability to force Apple to open their Apple Pay API's on their terms. Today, as presented below, it's a different story in Australia.

Last week Patently Apple posted a report titled "Four Years After Apple Pay was introduced, German Banks & Retailers are Finally onboard." There's no doubt that Apple Pay has had resistance by financial institutions around the globe and so the investigation into the six institutions in Switzerland by COMCO should come as no surprise.