Mobile payments in Moscow metro: promises confirmed

[img_assist|nid=9831|title=|desc=|link=none|align=left|width=100|height=75]Starting from the middle of 2009 Moscow residents will be enabled to pay for metro with their mobile phones. The city authorities are planning to install appropriate devices in metro to allow passengers to pay their fares by withdrawing funds from mobile phone account.

Dmitry Gayev, head of Moscow subway reported that a new cashless fare payments system will be widely adopted across all metro stations.

First reports about prospective implementation of mobile payments in Moscow metro were made a year ago. At that time the authorities of the city metro stated that the project would be developed in partnership with Nokia, Bank of Moscow and international payment system Visa.

Supposedly the opportunity to pay metro fare with a mobile phone would be available to the users of the special Nokia series. Dmitry Gayev stated that beginning from January 2008 Zelenograd-based company Micron would introduce dedicated SIM cards compatible with any mobile device. But the current information shows that the plans were delayed to a later term.