London commuters trial mobile payments

Rumours of a London-based trial to let commuters pay for tube journeys using their mobile phones were confirmed today as a consortium of industry players launched the UK's first large-scale trial of near field communications (NFC) technology to test the merits and potential pitfalls of rolling out the technology commercially.

Transport for London (TfL) is working with AEG, Barclaycard, Nokia, O2, TranSys and Visa on the trial, which will consider the pros and cons of two separate but interlinked services: paying for travel on the capital's buses, trams and tubes using a phone with inbuilt NFC technology and mobile payments for low-value items under £10.

Some 500 O2 customers in London are taking part in the six-month trial, which will run until May 2008, although the parties involved don't expect to be able to launch a full-blown commercial initiative until at least the end of next year.

Each person involved in the pilot has been given a Nokia 6131 NFC handset and O2 Wallet, with 225 of the test candidates having been bestowed with £200 worth of credit by Barclaycard.

"I've worked at O2 for a number of years and seen a number of technologies pass over my desk and come to market. I think NFC represents a step change in the way users will actually use mobile technologies and mobile phones," said Cath Keers, O2 UK's customer director. "The pilot we're launching today is moving it from a concept to turn it into a reality."

Keers then showed a series of photos of how those involved envisage the technology working in practice.

"[When the women in the case study returns home] she realises that she left her wallet on the kitchen table but she didn't need it and she didn't miss it," Keers added. "[With this trial] we're trying to understand how people are actually going to use [the technology]. It's all fundamentally about understanding the customer insight."

Contrary to earlier suggestions, customers will not be charged through their mobile phone account. Instead, they can top up their Oyster credit using cash or cards at stations.

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