O2 announces Visa as mobile wallet NFC partner

O2 will partner with Visa to deliver its “mobile wallet” contactless payment service in the second half of this year.

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The mobile wallet will “hold” money on behalf of customers to enable them to make purchases via their smartphones, send money to other people, top up their credit and shop through their device’s browser and apps.

The telecoms company will also relaunch its Visa O2 Money prepaid cards with contactless capabilities.

O2 is partnering with global epayments provider Wave Crest to provide the wallet and cards’ banking platform. FIS, the world’s largest provider of banking and payments technology, will provide customer service and transaction processing for the products.

Managing director of O2’s financial services James Le Brocq says: “These partnerships take us another step closer to the launch of commercial mobile wallet services…we look forward to unveiling additional partners in the coming months.”

The mobile wallet app will be developed by Intelligent Environments.

O2 is set to relaunch its Money division to coincide with the rollout of its contactless payment services and will run an advertising campaign to communicate the change.