Barclays to Add London Transit to Contactless Cards
Transport for London Dec 14 2006 : Barclays Bank is to launch contactless credit and debit cards that double up as Oyster travel cards.
Oyster is a prepaid contactless smart card that contains London transit tickets. Since Oyster was launched in 2003, 6 million cards have been issued to Londoners. Oyster cards can be topped up over the Internet, by phone or at a ticket office. One of the UK's top five banks, Barclays has signed an agreement with TranSys, which runs the Oyster card scheme on behalf of Transport for London (TfL), the capital's transit authority. The deal gives Barclays exclusive rights to place Oyster on contactless Barclaycard credit cards and Barclays Connect Visa debit cards for the next three years. Barclays says its contactless credit and debit cards will contain EMV chip-and-PIN technology. For transactions over £10 (US$19.70), cardholders will need to swipe their cards and enter a PIN. However, for payments under that amount, cardholders will simply wave their cards in front of a contactless reader, Barclays says. Following a trial in February 2007 involving Barclays, Visa, TranSys and TfL, the first Barclaycards and Barclays Connect cards to include Oyster will be issued in mid-2007, Barclays says. Barclays is the first UK bank to commit to launching contactless cards, although Royal Bank of Scotland has been trialing contactless cards at its Edinburgh head office. Last month, Visa UK announced that its member banks had agreed to roll out contactless cards across Britain, starting in London, by the end of next year.
Related Links
www.barclaycard.co.uk
Barclays news release
Transport for London website
Visa UK Plans Contactless Rollout in 2007
MasterCard Announces European Contactless Trials
RBS Says Contactless EMV Trial a Success
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