FirstGroup, the UK’s largest bus and rail operator, has announced it will invest £27 million in contactless ticketing technology for its 5,000 plus bus fleet throughout England. The company says they intend to be the first bus operator outside of London to accept contactless credit and debit card payments, which will be introduced across England […]

“We are committed to NFC at Google.” That is what the company’s Vice President of Payments Osama Bedier, told an audience of bankers and mobile operators in London on a summer afternoon. Less than a month following the announcement of Google Wallet and Google Offers, Bedier was nothing short of a rock star at the […]

Payfirma has announced that the next version of its Blackberry Mobile Payment App will support NFC payments. As for now, the just-released app allows Canadian merchants to accept and process credit cards on their Blackberry devices anywhere with a cellular or WIFI signal – either by swiping the card or punching the information directly into […]

Visa has announced that 43 Toronto Parking Authority (TPA) Green Parking lots have adopted Visa payWave contactless payments. The new system enables drivers to pay for parking by simply passing their payWave card near the contactless terminal to ‘check in’ to the parking lot, and once again when exiting to complete the transaction. Once the […]

Collis has announced that its Card Simulator and Brand Test Tool have both been qualified by MasterCard WorldWide for the formal PayPass Terminal Integration Process (TIP). According to Collis, the tools are used to test the behavior of the PayPass-enabled terminals according to the MasterCard rules without the need of physical test cards. The test […]

First Investment Bank, one of the largest banks in Bulgaria, is teaming up with Finnish IT company Tieto to bring contactless card payment solutions to the Bulgarian market. According to Tieto, the contactless card solution is designed to increases merchants’ business performance by offering their customers a ‘flexible and fast’ new way of paying – […]

Visa Europe has released the results of its first ‘Contactless Barometer’ survey showing mostly positive attitudes toward contactless payments in the UK. Of the 2,000 UK consumers surveyed, those who use contactless payment cards responded with overwhelming positive feedback and expressed a desire to see wider availability of the technology, reports Visa. According to the […]

An EMV Training Academy has been established in Pasadena, Calif. to facilitate the adoption of EMV chip and pin technology in the U.S. and Canadian banking industries. Led by a group of veteran payment industry professionals and technology partners, the EMV Training Academy offers training courses, test tools and consultancy services covering the North American […]

NXP Semiconductors has announced that its PN544 NFC chip has been chosen by Turkcell for Turkey’s first NFC-enabled smart phone. Manufactured by Huawei, the Turkcell T20 Android smart phone will enable Turkcell subscribers to perform a variety of contactless transactions, including payments, data sharing, public transport, event ticketing and access control, according to Turkcell. These […]

Verizon, AT&T T- Mobile are providing more than $100 million in new funding for their mobile payments joint venture Isis, an insider has revealed to Bloomberg. According to the source, the exact amount of funding will be determined by how many banks and merchants sign onto the service, which will debut next year in Salt […]