Verizon has apparently disabled the PayPal feature on its version of the Samsung Galaxy S5, though it remains unclear why it would do that.
The Samsung Galaxy S5 is the company's latest flagship smartphone and it comes with plenty of high-end specs and features to make it worthy of the title. Samsung even introduced the much-touted fingerprint scanning technology on its latest powerhouse, offering several neat options.
For instance, the fingerprint scanner on the Samsung Galaxy S5 can also authorize users to make payments via PayPal, making it easier to shop securely and with less hassle. PayPal even touted that it was starting to support this feature in 25 different markets, but Verizon is apparently not too excited with this option.
Samsung Galaxy S5 owners on Verizon Wireless are reportedly unable to use the PayPal feature, as Big Red has disabled it on its network. With this feature, Galaxy S5 users should be able to simply swipe their finger on the smartphone's home button and make purchases with their PayPal account, without needing to log in every time.
"The day has finally come when Samsung Galaxy S5 users in 25 countries can ditch their usernames and passwords and simply login to PayPal with their fingerprint to shop at the millions of businesses that accept PayPal on mobile web sites, mobile apps and in stores," PayPal touted a couple of days ago.
"Not only is this way more convenient than typing in a lengthy username and password on a tiny mobile device, it's also more secure. In fact, it's a convenience that many consumers are ready for. A recent survey by the National Cyber Security Alliance and PayPal found that more than half (53 percent) of Americans are overwhelmingly comfortable replacing passwords with newer technologies such as fingerprint authentication."
This neat PayPal feature is enabled and working on all major U.S. carriers, which makes it even odder than Verizon chose to disable it without any warning or explanation.
According to a new Droid-Life report, trying to make a PayPal purchase on a Verizon Galaxy S5 simply displays an error message that "the application will not work on your device."
"After spending only a few minutes with the Verizon variant of the GS5, we have already discovered that Big Red has pulled PayPal payments authorized with your fingerprint, another of the major features promoted by Samsung for their 2014 flagship," Droid-Life reported.
The AT&T version of the Samsung Galaxy S5, for instance, lists PayPal as one of the features available for the fingerprint scanner, but the Verizon model has deleted this option altogether.
Verizon has yet to offer an explanation as to why it has chosen to disable the PayPal feature on its Galaxy S5, but we'll update you as soon as we hear something from the carrier. In the meantime, drop by our comment section below and let us know whether you have stumbled upon the same issue when trying to make a PayPal payment on your Galaxy S5.
