SAN FRANCISCO, Sept 19 — A month ago, search giant Google announced that it was killing its virtual wallet application’s Near Field Communication compatibility, meaning that many existing users were about to lose their loyalty card and rewards points, and now we know why.

Announced on Tuesday, the seriously overhauled cash and credit card replacement service no longer needs an NFC-enabled device in order to work, meaning that from now on, anyone who thinks that carrying around physical coins and notes, credit, debit cards and in-store loyalty cards is far too much like hard work will only need an Android smartphone in order to adopt Google Wallet.

The service has also been updated so that users in the US will be able to send money to any other US friend, straight from their phone.

But the biggest change makes the service conspicuously like Apple’s Passbook. It can now hold virtual versions of a user’s loyalty cards. To add a card to the wallet, use the phone’s camera to scan its barcode and then when at the checkout, scan the app to collect additional points or coupons.

The new app will be available later this week for US Google Play store users, and to download it for free, all that’s needed is a bank account and a phone running Android version 2.3.3 or later.

Although Google’s Google Wallet, as well as a host of other virtual cash providers, from PayPal to Visa’s Isis, have really struggled to ignite consumers’ imaginations — Google Wallet launched in 2011 yet very few stores support the point of sales technology needed for the initial NFC-version of the app to work — analysts believe that by 2018 as many as 400 million consumers will have started to use their smartphones to make mobile money transfers.

However, until a company can come up with a truly revolutionary, simple and secure alternative, consumers look like they’re more than happy to continue using physical cards and cash rather than their smartphones when it comes to paying for goods, saving their mobile device for the paying of specific bills and for topping up air time and data allowance credit.

In this respect, Apple might be on to something with the latest addition to its mobile operating system — the software behind its phones and tablets. Called iBeacon, it is a way for shops to communicate directly with consumers’ iPhones via Bluetooth rather than NFC and could be used for making cashless, cardless and even contact-less purchases. As long as the consumer has his or her phone in a pocket, the sale is automatic.

When the iPhone 5 was launched in September 2012, analysts, financial experts and commentators alike were shocked that it didn’t support NFC — seen as many as the key technology for facilitating virtual wallets and the end of cash — but with the launch of iBeacon, now we know why Apple chose to ignore it; it had a much better idea up its sleeve.

It’s also interesting to note that Google, despite its two-year NFC hard sell, has decided to eliminate the need for the same technology from its wallet app too.

For more information about the updated features, visit Google’s official commerce blog here. — AFP/Relaxnews