MasterCard has introduced new mobile payment trial in Canada

The first near-field communications (NFS) trial of Mobile PayPass was completed in Canada. That was a result of collaboration of MasterCard Canada with Citi Cards Canada, a leading provider of general purpose and private label credit and charge cards in Canada, and Bell Mobility, the largest communications company of Canada. This new trial allowed its participants to make purchases through their mobile devices at MasterCard PayPass acceptance locations using Bell Mobility’s wireless network across Canada.

The PayPass payment application is stored inside the NFS-capable mobile phone’s built-in “secure area”. Whenever a PayPass enabled mobile phone is used – it is permanently under consumers’ individual control, and moreover it can also be password protected. Approximately 75 employees from Bell, Citi Cards and MasterCard confirmed that mobile payments through the new trial are easy, fast ad secure.

This new trial became a demonstration of MasterCard’s work at combining electronic payments with convenience which takes place all over the world. At the end of 2008 there were more than 50 million PayPass cards and devices in use at over 141,000 merchant locations worldwide. There are a number of PayPass trials and rollouts currently underway in 28 countries of the world. Introducing a PayPass trial in Canada was a great step towards bringing mobile payments to Canadian mobile users.