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This time last week Isle of Wight festivalgoers were using the latest prepaid contactless technology to pay using their wristbands

2011 Isle of Wight festivalgoersThis time last week Isle of Wight festivalgoers were using the latest prepaid contactless technology to pay using their wristbands

 

In a project combining MasterCard’s contactless payment technological with the retail expertise of Central Catering Services and event organisers, festival goers in the VIP area at the 2011 Isle of Wight Festival, which took place over the weekend, put the UK’s first ever MasterCard PayPass prepaid contactless wristbands to the test and rated them as a must-have for future live music events.

 

Avoiding event queues

 

Research conducted amongst those using the PayPass prepaid wristbands to ‘Tap & Go’ to pay found they were their preferred payment method at the festival. Respondents said they were quicker (96%) and easier to use (98%) than credit or debit cards, while a resounding 100% said they’d want to use the PayPass prepaid wristbands again to pay at other festivals, concerts and sporting events.

 

Distributed to people in the VIP enclosure on a first-come, first-served basis, the PayPass prepaid wristbands were pre-loaded with £30, which could be used to purchase food and drinks with a simple wave of their wrist at Central Catering’s bar and Jamie Oliver’s ‘Fabulous Feast’ restaurant.

 

Hany Fam, president of MasterCard UK & Ireland, said: “The project was really the first part of testing consumer acceptance of a truly ‘cashless’ environment, which has been much talked about in the festival world. With the willingness of the organisers to allow us access to their audience and the invaluable assistance of Central Catering, we have made some significant steps towards achieving this goal. We look forward to extending the PayPass prepaid wristbands to provide access as well as payments at more festivals and events across the UK.”

 

Mark Hatch, director of Central Catering, said: “We’ve played around with cashless systems in the past, as we see many future benefits in them, but had not yet found one that had a truly financial or totally practical viability. Working with MasterCard has been a revelation, as its world-leading innovation and technology have finally enabled us to put the real building blocks in place to deliver something truly workable and revolutionary.”

 

Easing hospitality pressures

 

Nigel Harris from Jamie Oliver’s Fabulous Feasts was equally impressed, adding: “The speed was incredible and left some customers just standing waiting for something else to happen, as they couldn’t believe the payment had taken literally seconds. We loved it!”

 

Among the many benefits of this technology are improved payment speeds, safer payments with the reduced need for cash or cards, reduction in retailers’ cash handling costs and more detailed accounting of transactions, according to MasterCard.

 

As of the first quarter of 2011, it said more than 92 million PayPass cards and devices have been issued for use at approximately 311,000 merchant locations worldwide.

 

In addition to the deployment of the PayPass prepaid wristbands, MasterCard also put terminals in some public areas for faster card payments and integrated them with the main gate access points, to demonstrate another aspect of its technological innovation: access control.

 

The research was conducted at the Isle of Wight Festival, which took place last weekend. It was compiled from 150 quantitative surveys from wristband users and 16 qualitative surveys.