Australian airline Qantas has begun testing a new service that lets passengers pre-enrol at home for its facial recognition-based digital boarding service by using the NFC functionality in their Android mobile phone to capture the photo stored in their passport’s security chip... More
Walmart-owned Sam’s Club is opening a new store in Dallas, Texas that will double as both a technology lab and a live retail store, enabling both customers and staff to test and make use of the latest developments in retail and payments technology... More
Rémy Cointreau is to integrate an NFC chip into the cork stopper of all the decanters produced by its Louis XIII luxury cognac brand to make it easy for buyers to register their purchase and become a member of the Louis XIII Society, a private club “where members can enjoy exclusive content, unique experiences and personalized services through their smartphones.”... More
Contactless payments usage has grown 30% in the UK over the past year to become the most popular card payment type for in-store transactions, Worldpay reports — and the growth is partly driven by an “astonishing” rise in consumer adoption of mobile payment services... More
Card-on-file EMV tokenization, where primary account numbers (PANs) stored in a card-on-file database are replaced with payment tokens that can be restricted to a specific retailer, offers online merchants a way to both increase security and create a near frictionless buying experience, Rambus explains in a new ebook which is available to download from the NFC World Knowledge Centre... More
Enabling customers to scan items in the aisle as they shop and then check themselves out and complete the payment process all from their mobile phone holds multiple benefits for retailers aiming to improve the in-store experience, cut costs and increase revenues, a new white paper from Rambus explains... More
One in five organizations has experienced payments data theft over the past 12 months — ACI Worldwide — “36% of organizations believe they are at a greater risk of data breach than a year ago. 44% agreed with the view that: My company would not invest in fraud solutions that add friction to the customer experience.”
Grab and Samsung sign MOU to drive digital inclusion in south-east Asia — Samsung — “Grab and Samsung will work together on a wide range of initiatives to bring the benefits of technology, such as enhanced customer experiences and improved income opportunities, to millions of consumers and Grab driver-partners across south-east Asia… The two companies will also work together to expand into south-east Asia’s fragmented mobile payments ecosystem and provide a mobile payments solution that will serve the needs of consumers in south-east Asia.”
Mastercard establishes biometrics as the new normal for safer online shopping — Mastercard — “Consumers will have the capability to use biometrics, such as fingerprints or facial recognition, as a way to identify themselves when they shop and pay with Mastercard as of April 2019… This shift to biometrics is part of Mastercard’s new action plan to help banks, retailers and partners to prevent fraud and improve the consumer experience in the new digital environment. It also meets new regulatory requirements around Strong Customer Authentication set out by PSD2 and is aimed at ensuring a smoother consumer experience and reducing unjustified declines.”
A 20-page ebook that shows how developers and product designers are using NFC to deliver next generation user experiences in transportation, retail, marketing and product authentication, and the Internet of Things is now available to download from the NFC World Knowledge Centre... More
Majority of EMEA retailers plan to increase investment in payments — ACI Worldwide — “55% of retailers and merchants in the EMEA region are planning to increase their investment into new payment capabilities in the next 18 to 24 months… 66% say they are willing to pay more for a broader range of payment services if they add value to their business. 89% say they would expect increased operational efficiency and 88% enhanced customer experience from their investment.”
A survey of consumer attitudes to emerging technologies has found that the majority of both US and European consumers now believe that using fingerprint scanning to pay for purchases is ‘cool’ — but UK and European consumers are divided on the idea of contactless shopping services like Amazon Go, with 40% considering the technology to be ‘cool’ and 31% seeing it as ‘creepy’... More
Singapore’s postal service provider SingPost is rolling out 50,000 NFC tags to delivery and collection points across the island and is to equip 1,000 postmen with NFC smartphones to “raise postal service quality and improve operational efficiency”... More
Discover enhances customer service with in-app messaging — Discover — “The new feature, which will be rolled out in phases, enables customers to message Discover’s customer service representatives via the Discover mobile app… Messaging allows customers to message back and forth with an agent whenever it is convenient for them, eliminating the need to stay logged in to the app in order to reach a customer service representative.”
Lloyds Bank is to start sending push notifications about special deals with selected retailers to customers’ smartwatches and smartphones... More
McDonald’s sees accepting NFC mobile payments as part of its on-going customer service improvement remit, the fast food giant’s Anja Carroll has told NFC World+... More
“Square Register’s sales, refund and settlement data can now all be used as triggers for IFTTT recipes,” GigaOm reports... More
Australian telecommunications provider Telstra is now applying NFC tags to all its broadband modems, enabling customers to access personalised help, information and support recommendations by tapping the tag with their NFC phone... More
St George Bank is testing the use of Bluetooth LE technology to send a welcome message and personalised information directly to a customer’s iPhone when they enter a branch... More
Mobile point-of-sale specialist Square has introduced a new service that “turns the receipt into a conversation channel”... More