Yesterday, Apple debuted its new iTunes Pass service in Japanese Apple Stores, allowing users to buy iTunes Store credit directly without the need for physical gift cards. Today, Apple has begun to roll out the service in the United States (via iPhoneHacks).
To use the service, customers must add a new iTunes Pass inside of the existing Passbook app in iOS, and then locate a Specialist at an Apple Retail Store. Once located, a customer can tell the Specialist how much money they would like and the amount is instantly transferred to the Pass. Essentially, the service streamlines the process for customers who rely on iTunes gift cards to purchase things on the iTunes Store, App Store and iBooks Store.
Earlier this year, reports indicated that Apple was working on its own mobile payments service, which could bear some resemblance to iTunes Pass. The payments service would reportedly be integrated within iOS and allow customers to pay for physical goods in stores with their iPhones.
Update 11:48 PM: As spotted by Apfelpage.de (Google Translate), iTunes Pass has also gone live in Germany.
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Top Rated Comments
If you're wanting to use cash to get the iTunes credit this makes you get up and go to your nearest apple store which for 99% of people will be farther than the nearest place selling iTunes cards.
If that's what Apple's plan is, and they're not going to charge any fees for "loading" money, then once they're accepted in a lot of places, that will make them a better deal than most of the reloadable credit cards that a lot of Americans that don't have a checking accounts use (like Greendot, etc).