Details of Android Pay’s Canada launch leak before official launch tomorrow

The launch of Android Pay in Canada has been in the works for quite some time, and a report last week said that the service is finally launching there on May 31st. Now, the day before the service is set to go live, one publication seems to have accidentally published the details of the launch…

According to this now-redacted post, the service is launching tomorrow, as expected, and will support Canadian MasterCard and Visa cards, as well as Interac debit cards from a variety of financial institutions. The site says that initially, the service will support cards from BMO, CIBC, Banque Nationale, Scotiabank, Desjardins, President’s Choice Financial, ATB Financial and Canadian Tire Financial Services.

That’s a pretty good list of banks, but it’s not going to cover everyone. The list notably excludes TD Canada Trust, and the Royal Bank of Canada, two huge institutions. While there’s no word on those yet, the report notes that Google has said support for American Express and Tangerine is “coming soon.”

“Canada is one of the most advanced countries in terms of mobile payment readiness across the world. That meant Canada was one of those places high on our list of where we wanted to make Android Pay available first,” said Pali Bhat, Google’s vice president told FP in an interview.

Canada is the latest country to get Android Pay, following closely behind its recent launch in Russia. As is the case with Android Pay in all countries, you’ll need a device running at least Android KitKat 4.4.