As much as I rag (rightfully) on Xiaomi for some of their decisions, you do see that NFC support is very spotty on the budget and even mid-range phones across the board. I have been looking at Samsung A35, A54, and A55 and NFC support is a toss up depending on which shop you buy from. Some places (sellers on Takealot) seem to be importing cheaper phones from Malaysia and Saudi to sell here which have no NFC support in South Africa on Samsung Pay (Google Pay may or may not work as well depending on the coutnry). Incredible Connection seem to have Samsung A35 which have NFC which work in South Africa for R5999 if you are still interested.I purchased an Xiaomi Redmi 14C during the Black Friday week last year.
I did some research and for the R2499.00 price tag it seemed reasonable, especially with Andriod 14 on it and ample memory.
Also ensured that the specs indicted that it had NFC support.
But when I tried to setup my Google Wallet, to my disappointed it did not support NFC. I initially thought that is was just disabled but could not find any setting to enable it.
I eventually emailed Xiaomi support , just to receive a response that NFC support is regional based and that NFC is NOT supported in South Africa.
What a let down - will NEVER buy Xiaomi again.