Supermarkets in Netherlands trial mobile grocery shopping
By Dusan Belic on Friday, October 12th, 2007 at 8:23 AM PST In Technologies
A branch of Dutch chain C1000 is running a six-month pilot program that involves 100 customers, which are also Rabobank online account holders, paying for their shopping via their mobiles. The program is run by LogicaCMG and uses an existing online PIN payment system.
Each customer in the program has a phone equipped with technology supporting wireless information exchange over a short distance (NFC?). Once he/she has finished his/her shopping, the reader gets the information from the phone (unique ID linked to the shopper’s bank account) and once the PIN has been entered, the supermarket gets money from the customer’s bank account. Neat and sooo convenient. I wonder when we’ll see this technology implemented on a wider scale…
[Via: textually.org]
Isn’t this similar to what is already happening in Japan with Suica, Edy, and Pasmo. These systems can be linked to a credit cards and are widely accepted.