The GSM Association is reporting on their own initiative to allow mobiles to be used for payment systems in retail outlets - effectivly having them act as debit cards through your mobile bill. A number of operators are on board, as well as network operators, but I can;t help feeling that this is a solution in need of a problem.
Read on in the full article.
I've been waiting for this for quite a while. Really excited to know I can finally get rid of my ugly wallet. 😊
This kind of service has already been available for quite a while in Finland, for example the famous coke machines that let you buy a soft drink just by texting or phoning the number on the machine.
So far it hasn't really caught on in physical shops, it's mainly been used by mail order companies advertising on TV. You enter your address on the text message and send it to the advertised number, and the product is then charged to your phone bill.
Another big use is for charity donations, charities advertise a range of phone numbers which charge various amounts of money to your phone bill so you can choose the amount you want to donate.
The problem seems to be that it's just much quicker and easier to hand over a card than dial a number when you're queueing to pay for something. With mail order it's different of course, and it's arguably more secure to pay by text message than to risk sending your card details through the post or read them out to a stranger in a call centre.