Barclays gives away 50,000 contactless coffees

Barclays will be giving away 50,000 single use contactless payment cards at this weekend's Thames Festival to get consumers used to the idea of the 'wave and pay' tech.

Festival goers will be able to pick up one of the one-off cards on either Saturday or Sunday and use the stored credit to pay for a drink at Coffee Republic at Jubilee Gardens on London's South Bank.

The coffee outlet will house six of the 6,000 readers able to take Barclays contactless payments in the UK.

Barclays announced its first contactless credit card a year ago. The card, called OnePulse, can be used for contactless payments and as an Oyster card, and also as a standard credit card.

The bank recently told silicon.com it will be expanding the range of plastic able to make contactless payments, as it seeks to have a million wave and pay cards in the hands of its customers by the end of this year.