{"id":498444,"date":"2026-05-23T03:20:24","date_gmt":"2026-05-23T03:20:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/498444\/"},"modified":"2026-05-23T03:20:24","modified_gmt":"2026-05-23T03:20:24","slug":"are-people-using-apple-pay-to-scam-restaurants-now","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/498444\/","title":{"rendered":"Are People Using &#8216;Apple Pay&#8217; To Scam Restaurants Now?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>\t\t\t\t<img fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-24037414\" src=\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/California-woman-goes-to-fine-dining-.jpg\" alt=\"woman attempts to apple pay (l) restaurant manager shares day in the job (c) woman goes to fine dine for her birthday (r)\" width=\"1024\" height=\"576\"  \/><\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-media-credit\"><a href=\"www.tiktok.com\/@arock_starr\/video\/7639752381919481119\/\" target=\"_blank\">Via iStockphoto \/ @arock_starr TikTok<\/a><\/p>\n<p>Lately, it seems like there are fewer and fewer reasons to carry around a <strong>wallet<\/strong>.<\/p>\n<p>While it\u2019s always convenient to carry around an ID and a<strong> little cash<\/strong>, an increasing number of people are relying on their <strong>phones<\/strong> for just about everything. The TSA will now let passengers use <a href=\"https:\/\/www.tsa.gov\/digital-id\/participating-states\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">digital IDs<\/a> from some states, and according to <a href=\"https:\/\/www.apple.com\/apple-pay\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">Apple<\/a>, over 85% of retailers accept the company\u2019s<strong> tap-to-pay<\/strong> service, called <a href=\"https:\/\/brobible.com\/culture\/article\/denver-bartender-apple-pay\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">Apple Pay<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>But no matter how <strong>popular<\/strong> these services have become, that does not mean that they work everywhere. Now, a user on TikTok says that a customer tried to use this fact to attempt to run a <strong>scam<\/strong> on her restaurant.<\/p>\n<p>What Happened At This Restaurant?<\/p>\n<p>In a video with over 465,000 views, TikTok user @arock_starr, who is a manager at an upscale restaurant, claims that a woman walked into her restaurant saying that it was her birthday and that she planned to have a group of four.<\/p>\n<p>While this would usually be an occasion to celebrate, the TikToker claims that something immediately seemed off about the woman. This suspicion continued when the woman\u2019s friends arrived.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cTwo of her friends walk in, and I\u2019m like, \u2018Hey, are you looking for so and so?\u2019 And they\u2019re like, \u2018Uh\u2026\u2019 Like, they seem confused,\u201d the TikToker recalls. \u201c\u2018Birthday girl? Like, \u2018She\u2019s over here if you want me to show you the table.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The friends apparently refused to sit with the woman, deciding to seat themselves at the bar.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWeird,\u201d the TikToker declares. \u201cIt\u2019s giving \u2018girls\u2019 trip gone wrong.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Eventually, it came time to pay. While one of the pairs in the friend group paid and left, the original woman and another woman said they could only pay with Apple Pay\u2014a service the restaurant did not accept. From here, things got weird.<\/p>\n<p>An Apple Pay Debacle<\/p>\n<p>The TikToker says that she did not want to immediately write off the woman. Instead, she decided to try to find ways to accommodate the woman\u2019s payment method.<\/p>\n<p>It was at this point that she realized something was amiss with the woman\u2019s Apple Pay.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cAs she\u2019s pulling it up, it doesn\u2019t look like Apple Pay,\u201d the TikToker explains. \u201cIt has, like, an icon of a credit card. The thing that she\u2019s pulling up, it looks like a picture of a PDF file.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Confused, the TikToker asked the woman if she could tap to pay. The woman insisted she could not and that the details had to be entered manually. When the TikToker insisted this was not possible, the woman proceeded to \u201cstart typing it in herself.\u201d The card was immediately declined.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cShe does it again, starts typing it, gets declined again, and it gets really weird,\u201d the TikToker states.<\/p>\n<p>From here, the woman claimed she just needed to unlock her card, and that her ID was in her car. The TikToker knew this wasn\u2019t true, as the ID was attached to her phone and visible.<\/p>\n<p>Simply trying to sort out a payment, she asked to scan the woman\u2019s visible ID. The woman affirmed that this was OK, but the woman with whom she was dining responded by seemingly attempting to distract the waitstaff.<\/p>\n<p>There\u2019s A Kerfuffle<\/p>\n<p>The distraction attempt didn\u2019t work. From there, the woman seemingly pivoted strategy, taking issue with the fact that the TikToker scanned her ID using her phone.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cShe\u2019s like, \u2018Whoa, whoa, whoa. What did you just do?\u201d the TikToker recounts. \u201cI\u2019m like, \u2018I just took a photo of your ID. Like I said, I need to scan your ID.\u2019 \u2018Oh, well, show me. Show me. What did you just do? \u2026 This is shady.\u2019 Blah blah, blah, blah, blah.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI\u2019m like, \u2018I told you that I needed a copy of your ID,\u2019\u201d the TikToker continues. \u201c\u2019Well, you didn\u2019t make a copy of it. You took a photo of it in your personal phone.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Not wanting to escalate matters, the TikToker said she would delete the copy of the ID\u2014as long as the woman would accompany her to make a scanned copy of it. The TikToker said she would not run the payment unless she had a copy of the ID.<\/p>\n<p>While the woman initially seemed compliant, she then became \u201caggressive.\u201d She demanded that the payment be run on the card, then, when that was not possible, began getting angry at other staff members. Finally, she threatened to leave without paying.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cSo I told her that I was gonna call the police, and she doubled down and threatened to call the police on me,\u201d the TikToker says in a <a href=\"https:\/\/www.tiktok.com\/@arock_starr\/video\/7639757891414609183\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">follow-up<\/a>. \u201cI was like, \u2018OK, girl, whatever. Either way, one of us is gonna have to call and sort this out, because this is just nuts.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n<p>But when the TikToker began calling the police, the story took an unexpected turn.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWhen she hears me talking to the police, all of a sudden, she takes a quick turn, goes back over to the bar, takes out this giant roll of money\u2026 Not even counting through it, just takes out a few hundreds and throws it down on the table,\u201d the TikToker states. \u201cThe same person who had no other form of payment.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>What Was The Scam Here?<\/p>\n<p>Digital wallet fraud, where a scammer tricks you into adding your card to their digital wallet, is a <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/money\/2026\/jan\/04\/digital-wallet-fraud-bank-card-stolen-fraud-apple-pay-google-pay\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">real problem<\/a>. That said, it does not appear to be what happened here.<\/p>\n<p>Given the TikToker\u2019s description of events\u2014and her <a href=\"https:\/\/www.tiktok.com\/@arock_starr\/video\/7640145363839618335\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">later claims<\/a> that her ID did not match the name she provided when asking to be seated, and that the ID did not look like her\u2014another option is more likely here. Simply put, this is probably credit card fraud.<\/p>\n<p>Credit card fraud is when someone attempts to make a purchase using stolen credit card information. This is incredibly common; stolen credit card details can be <a href=\"https:\/\/www.experian.com\/blogs\/ask-experian\/heres-how-much-your-personal-information-is-selling-for-on-the-dark-web\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">purchased for as low as $10<\/a>. This widespread availability may be why <a href=\"https:\/\/www.security.org\/digital-safety\/credit-card-fraud-report\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">over 60% of Americans<\/a> say they\u2019ve been the victim of credit card fraud.<\/p>\n<p>With stolen card information, a skilled scammer can invent a story in order to be able to use the card, even without all of the original cardholder\u2019s details. They can create a fake ID, print fake credit cards with the stolen information\u2014or, if they\u2019re feeling a bit lazy, just take a screenshot of the stolen card and claim it\u2019s a broken Apple Pay payment.<\/p>\n<p>Can You Use Apple Pay Without Tap-To-Pay?<\/p>\n<p>Generally speaking, Apple Pay <a href=\"https:\/\/www.apple.com\/apple-pay\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">requires<\/a> wireless tap-to-pay acceptance to work. If a business accepts tap-to-pay, chances are high that they will also accept Apple Pay.<\/p>\n<p>However, in cases where one only has Apple Pay and the business does not accept any wireless payments, there\u2019s a chance you can still use your Apple Wallet to complete the payment.<\/p>\n<p>In the Wallet, a user can add their card details. If you pull up Apple Pay, tap the card, then look at the top, there is an icon resembling a credit card with numbers. By tapping that, one can access their card information.<\/p>\n<p>From there, this can be entered manually into some businesses\u2019 credit card processors. Alternatively, if one uses Apple Cash, their <a href=\"https:\/\/support.apple.com\/en-al\/119943\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">virtual card number<\/a> can be accessed the same way.<\/p>\n<p>That said, a business may not want to process cards in this way, or they may need to confirm one\u2019s ID before deciding to run the card.<\/p>\n<p>Commenters Say You Can\u2019t Rely On Apple Pay<\/p>\n<p>In the comments section, users said that there were many details of the story that were suspect. To start, some questioned the woman\u2019s alleged reliance on Apple Pay.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cGoing around depending on Apple Pay is wild in general,\u201d a user wrote.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cAs someone who works in a restaurant, it amazes me how many people will sit down and eat and drink and then wait til the very end to ask if we take apple pay,\u201d another said.<\/p>\n<p>Others speculated as to why she acted in this manner.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cShe wanted you to type it in because she was going to file a chargeback,\u201d said a commenter. \u201cThe merchant can see if it was swiped or not, and if it wasn\u2019t, it\u2019s a much better chance she gets her money back.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cShe wasn\u2019t planning to pay at all lol,\u201d declared a further TikToker.<\/p>\n<p>BroBible reached out to @arock_starr via TikTok direct message and comment.<\/p>\n<p>\t\t\t<script async src=\"\/\/www.tiktok.com\/embed.js\"><\/script><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Via iStockphoto \/ @arock_starr TikTok Lately, it seems like there are fewer and fewer reasons to carry around&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":498445,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[257],"tags":[48725,18,19,17,279,112,12314,82,82014],"class_list":["post-498444","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-mobile","tag-dining","tag-eire","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-mobile","tag-restaurants","tag-scams","tag-technology","tag-weird-news"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@ie\/116621740061649412","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/498444","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=498444"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/498444\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/498445"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=498444"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=498444"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=498444"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}