Bell and CIBC announced today that the carrier’s NFC-capable smartphones, such as the Samsung Galaxy S4 and BlackBerry Q10, are now able to make small credit card purchases on touchless terminals.
CIBC already worked with Rogers and TELUS on the project, so Bell’s integration, which Nauby Jacob, Bell’s VP of Products, Services & Content says was a long time in the making, completes the trifecta.
“A launch like this is about waiting for the right moment,” said Jacob. “We now have enough NFC devices in the market, and enough contactless points of sale in the market” to make this a viable product.
Bell is preparing to launch a mobile wallet, similar to Rogers suretap, with credit and loyalty card support, but in the meantime Canada’s third-largest carrier by subscriber numbers is boasting it has more banks on board than any other provider. CIBC joins TD Canada Trust, RBC and Desjardins in the carrier’s mobile payment ecosystem, with more to come.
“We believe that every bank should be with every carrier,” said Jacob, “but that’s a lot of work and a lot of time.” He notes that banks, credit card companies and and network providers must work together to educate customers on the benefits of mobile payments, and how they can work in conjunction with the credit cards customers already have in their wallets.
Like other mobile payment solutions, customers must have a secure SIM card and an NFC-capable smartphone, which encompasses most new Android phones and all BlackBerry devices since the Bold 9900. In addition to storing payment credentials securely on the SIM card, paired with a single device and protected by a passcode, Bell says that the credentials are never transmitted over the cellular network, and purchases are limited to $100 per transaction.
The CIBC Mobile Payment app will be updated to support Bell devices in the coming weeks, on both the Google Play Store and BlackBerry World, and will work with the following devices: Samsung Galaxy S4, Samsung Galaxy S III, Samsung Galaxy Note II, HTC One (M7), BlackBerry Q10, BlackBerry Z10, BlackBerry Bold 9900.
[source]Bell[/source]
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