Orange UK teamed up with Barclaycard back in March of 2009, announcing that they’d be working together to roll out NFC to British consumers. “Today you pay for things by cash or on your credit card” said Tom Alexander, CEO of Orange UK. “Tomorrow, you’ll use your mobile to buy the things you want, whether that’s on the high street or the internet.” Here we are, 10 months later, and Orange UK has announced an NFC enabled credit card. I know what you’re thinking, isn’t the sole purpose of NFC enabled mobile payments to eliminate credit cards? Then I got to thinking, there are no worthwhile NFC enabled devices on the market today. You try selling NFC to someone used to owning something like an iPhone or Nokia N97 Mini and then asking them to downgrade to some four digit model number Nokia. This credit card makes sense. It’s also got some nifty features:
- NFC payments only work on purchases £10 ($16) or under. It sucks, but then again I’m sure this limit will change once more NFC readers are deployed.
- Receive an SMS when a payment is made. Useful for parents keeping track of their children, but also useful for adults keeping an eye on their finances.
- Receive an SMS every week or every month with your balance. Useful for people like me who use their cards 20+ times a day and don’t want a text every time they buy a can of Red Bull.
- Points you can redeem at Orange Shops, Marks & Spencer, HMV, various donations, or for trips and special events.
[Reminder: One of my predictions for 2010 was that the next iPhone will have NFC]