Bank extends contactless payment project

The Royal Bank of Scotland is extending its trial of contactless payments technologies.

RBS has been running the first Maestro PayPass trial in Europe at its Edinburgh headquarters and now plans to extend the project to its London offices to further showcase the technology.

PayPass works much like the Oyster card on the London Underground - users place the card on a reader in retail outlets to make payments for low-value items such as coffee or a newspaper.

An RBS spokesman told silicon.com: "The early signs around the success of our Edinburgh pilot are very encouraging from both consumers' and retailers' points of view.

silicon.com Financial Services

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"In the meantime, we've extended the RBS internal trial to one of our key London locations, which provides a further opportunity for us to gain feedback on contactless payments from our staff."

According to MasterCard, which provides the underlying technology, a time-and-motion study of the Edinburgh trial - which covered six outlets including a Starbucks, a restaurant, a delicatessen, a chemist and a social club - found that Maestro PayPass could halve the time for a cash transaction, making a payment possible in less than five seconds.

The RBS spokesman added: "More than 1,500 members of our staff have signed up for the trial, and based on the positive feedback we have received, we are in talks with MasterCard and other card issuers with a view to trialling the contactless cards in another UK location."