Barclays bank account holders in the UK can now use a new feature in their mobile banking app to stop their card from being used to make purchases in one or more of five categories of retailer — grocery stores and supermarkets; restaurants, takeaways, pubs and bars; petrol stations; gambling sites and betting shops; premium rate websites and phone lines... More
MediaMarktSaturn, Europe’s largest consumer electronics retailer, is piloting a mobile self-checkout service that lets customers add products to their shopping basket by tapping the NFC tag included in the digital price tags of more than 100,000 products on sale at its Hamburg city centre store... More
Tesco spin-off Jack’s opens its doors with free mobile ‘Smart Shop’ app — Internet Retailing — “With the app, shoppers can scan the item’s barcode or shelf-front price code and then pay by simply tapping their phone on a self-service checkout terminal before leaving. The app also helps the shopper log what they have bought and how much they have paid.”
Amazon Pay accepted here? Web giant aims to put digital wallet in stores — The Wall Street Journal — “Amazon.com Inc is gearing up to challenge Apple Inc in the mobile payments race. The e-commerce giant is working to persuade brick-and-mortar merchants to accept its Amazon Pay digital wallet, according to people familiar with the matter, attempting to expand a service now used primarily for purchases online.”
The percentage of payments made with a mobile phone in UK stores has jumped from 1.3% in Q3 2016 to 5.6% in Q3 2018, an analysis of 190m card transactions has shown... 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
US discount store giant Target is equipping staff across its 1,800+ shops with mobile POS terminals “that’ll let you skip those Black Friday lines.”... More
Convenience store giant 7-Eleven is piloting a mobile self-checkout service in 14 stores in the Dallas area, just two months after it began accepting contactless and mobile payments across its 8,000+ US stores... More
Mastercard’s Pay with Rewards service is to relaunch at the end of this year with a new app that will allow cardholders to pay with the points or miles they have collected from any card, airline, hotel or retail rewards program that has signed up to use the service at any Mastercard merchant worldwide... More
Amazon is entering the in-store payments market in India with the launch of ‘Amazon Smile’ QR codes that will enable shoppers to make purchases in shops... More
Idemia and JCB partner to launch Google Pay in Japan — Idemia — “Users will be able to make contactless mobile payments in store using their JCB branded credit, debit, and prepaid cards enrolled in their Google Pay, at places such as convenience stores, supermarkets, drug stores and other shops where QuicPay [JCB’s contactless payment product] is accepted… It allows not only JCB, but also its issuing and processing partners to integrate with Google Pay and offer real-time enrolment, provisioning and tokenization capabilities.”
H&M and Klarna partner to elevate the modern shopping experience for consumers — H&M Group — “H&M and Klarna will further integrate H&M’s digital and physical stores to give customers a seamless, personalised and engaging shopping experience no matter where, when and how they shop… This will include frictionless instore, mobile and online payments, simplified deliveries and returns and the flexibility to decide how and when to pay including the popular ‘try before you buy’ pay later service.”
GS25 brings facial recognition to new shop — Korea JoongAng Daily — “Most convenience stores without a human cashier use barcodes to identify the products. GS25’s new system instead identifies an item by its packaging and weight. This allows customers to simply place items on the table before paying using facial recognition or a credit card. The company says it takes only about a second for the system to recognize five items at once, whereas with the conventional barcode system it would take 15 seconds to scan them one by one.”
NFC technology can be used by both brands and retailers to forge and strengthen a connection with consumers throughout the customer journey, the NFC Forum explains in a new white paper that provides detailed tips, ideas and guidance on how to take advantage of the technology’s potential... More
M&S rolls out checkout free checkout as part of digital first strategy — Marks & Spencer — “M&S has today announced the launch of its scan and pay service, Mobile, Pay, Go, which will be available for customers in six London stores ahead of Christmas… The pacey roll out follows a successful trial of the service at Waterside Simply Food over the summer. The store now sees 20% of its sales from Mobile, Pay, Go with an average of 170 items being purchased through the app every hour.”
‘Just Walk Out’ shopping and other smart checkout tech to reach over $45bn transactions by 2023, as retailers strive to eliminate lines — Juniper Research — “Retail spend at frictionless payment stores like Amazon Go will grow from an estimated US$253m in 2018 to over US$45bn by 2023. Juniper expects most of these transactions to be in convenience and general stores, with an average transaction value around US$30 per visit… Self-scanning apps, an alternative to ‘Just Walk Out’ technologies, will be used by over 32 million shoppers by 2023.”
PARTNER NEWS: Online merchants, payment service providers and acquirers can now use the Rambus Token Gateway to tokenize card-on-file ecommerce transactions, enabling sensitive cardholder payment data to be replaced with secure tokens and removing the need for consumers to update their card details following a card reissue... More
The Conran Shop and Pinterest collaborate to create an immersive and personalised shopping experience — Pinterest — “Customers will also be able to use their smartphones to explore the products and activate unique digital experiences via integrated near-field communication (NFC) technology. The NFC tags, powered by printed-electronics specialist, Thinfilm, are activated by tapping a smartphone on a featured hero product, which will automatically be added to a bespoke ‘Conran Wishlist’ on the customer’s personal Pinterest board.”
Skip the queue, scan and go: Sainsbury’s launches till-free shopping — Sainsbury’s — “In a UK supermarket first, Sainsbury’s is trialling new scan, pay and go technology that will enable customers in one of its busy London convenience stores to pay for products in-store using their smartphone… Using the latest version of the SmartShop app, customers visiting the Clapham North Station Local can use their smartphones to scan their shopping as they go and then pay for it through the app, from anywhere in the store, using Apple Pay.”
Buick delivers peace of mind at the gas pump — General Motors — “A new update to Marketplace brings ExxonMobil’s pay for fuel functionality right to the infotainment screen of eligible Buick vehicles… The platform also automatically syncs drivers to their ExxonMobil Speedpass+ app account, and drivers accumulate rewards points with each purchase. The new service is available at more than 11,000 Exxon or Mobil stations across the United States.”