Verizon has had a deal with ISIS in the pipes for a long time.  They were testing it before the NFC payment stuff was bag back before the Galaxy Nexus and Nexus 7 were awkwardly trying to touch enough other to transfer data and make paying for stuff super weird.  ISIS, now Softcard has a different system that works in a different way.  The rollout for it is still not complete, mostly because a lot of places haven't bought into this.  Apple's solution to this just shows how much pull they have these days... which is to say, A LOT.  It may not be innovation, but it has a hell of a lot more people on board for it. 

Just sign up for an account with Softcard, it probably works at more places than Google Wallet these days.