Coin - 8 Cards in 1

Some of you may have seen this floating around the web and even on some news channels... There's a product in development (and available for pre-order) called Coin. Basically it's a device the size of a credit card, which acts like a credit card, and syncs with your phone. This means you can store up to 8 credit cards, membership cards, loyalty cards, or whatever on it.

Here's the Coin site which has a lot more information:
https://onlycoin.com

If you decide to preorder one, use the link in my sig to give me a referral credit!

Essentially, you pair your Coin to your phone using low energy bluetooth. Then, you use the included card reader to swipe your cards into the Coin app. Then, you choose which cards you want on your Coin and your phone pushes the card data to the Coin itself. When you use the Coin to make purchases, you can select which card to pay with. You can also put things like gift cards on it or membership cards.

So, that's the overview. I'm curious what you all think about this. I've wanted something like this for a while and really like the idea of it because I could condense my wallet quite substantially by turning 8 cards into 1. I also like that your phone can alert you if you leave it somewhere and that if you lose it, it will deactivate itself after a certain amount of time. I've pre-ordered one for $50 which is half off the price they intend to sell them for. The $50 price is valid for another 7 days.

Curious to hear your thoughts!

 

Ha, no they don't ship until next summer. They have some demo videos and stuff around the web you could check out.

 

That's been an item of debate in the media. I think people are less concerned about that than they are merchants no accepting them. But keep in mind you use your CC number online freely and in other forms without issue. The Coin is a clone and presents itself as the original card, so the card issuer would never know.

A couple thoughts-
1. The merchants don't really have to approve it since you swipe your card into the Coin. They may not like it, but I don't know that they can or will forbid it. Also keep in mind the merchants may benefit from the Coin since if you lose your coin it disables itself and isn't as susceptible to skimming since it never displays your full card number.

2. You don't need your phone to use the Coin. You only need your phone to add/remove cards. The phone does, however, enhance the Coin with the autolock and other features which I believe are largely optional.

3. They said the button is designed not to be easily pressable by accident. They also say if you use the auto-lock feature no one can switch the card when the card is out of proximity to your phone.


I bought one figuring it would be a neat toy to play with and it looks like it may actually be a viable product. I'm hoping it's not delayed and really look forward to getting it. I'll also note, for those of you in Chip and Pin countries, that this does not have Chip ad Pin.

 

For anyone still interested in this, they've updated their FAQs with some more information about the Coin's security features:
https://onlycoin.com/support/faq/

Edit: They're also still 50% off, so $55 for a pre-order including shipping!