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Contactless payments speeds up coffee drinkers
Express-o service at Coffee Republic

By Natasha Lomas

Published: Wednesday 23 July 2008

Coffee chain Coffee Republic is rolling out contactless payment technology after a trial of Barclaycard Business's OneTouch system saw up to one in five credit card transactions being waved through this way.

The OneTouch system enables customers to pay for goods worth less than £10 by touching their Barclaycard to a reader - avoiding the need to enter a PIN or sign for the transaction.

The four-month trial took place at Coffee Republic's outlets in Broadgate, Bluewater shopping centre and Canary Wharf between January and April 2008 - and the company said it saw a 50 per cent rise in contactless payments in the Canary Wharf bar over the course of the trial.

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It said OneTouch will now be phased in to all 16 of its company-owned coffee bars around the UK, with discussions taking place with franchise outlets to extend the tech across the entire chain in the coming year.

The main advantage of contactless payments has been speeding up service by significantly decreasing the time taken per transaction, especially during peak retail hours.

Martin Townshend, operations director of Coffee Republic, said in a statement: "We were the very first coffee bar to sign up to contactless last year and since running the trial, OneTouch has helped us to remain ahead of the game amongst our competitors and serve customers as quickly as possible at the till."

Keisha Meade, Coffee Republic's Epos systems manager, added customers have "an incredible appetite for the technology" - especially those using the Canary Wharf bar where she said knowledge of the tech is strong.

Results from the trial show the highest volume of contactless transactions took place in March when 118 consumers opted to pay for items in this way, equating to 20 per cent of the total number of credit card transactions made that month, according to Coffee Republic.

It said on average, 100 contactless transactions were made every month during the trial, equating to 18 per cent of all credit card transactions made.

There has been no evidence of fraudulent transactions during the contactless trial, according to a Coffee Republic spokeswoman.

Earlier this year, Barclaycard Business announced more then 4,000 retail outlets had gone live with OneTouch - including Books Etc, Krispy Kreme, Rowlands Pharmacy and Yo! Sushi, and thousands of independent merchants.