UATP, the global travel payments network, announced Tuesday (Nov. 29) that it has inked a partnership with Paymagnet, the contactless payments company, to supply its member airlines with the ability to accept contactless card payments within an airline’s mobile app or on an NFC-enabled smartphone.
“This strategic alliance provides UATP Merchants with Paymagnet’s anti-fraud approach to accept mobile in-app card payments tailored to the airline industry,” Paymagnet Executive Director Martin Glettler said in the press release. “The initial focus of the partnership will be to work with low-cost carriers in Europe, where, in some areas, contactless payment penetration is up to 40–50 percent.”
According to the companies, any purchase that can be processed via a point-of-sale system can now be completed with a smartphone and Paymagnet. In order for it to work, the client taps a credit card near the smartphone’s NFC sensor, and Paymagnet then scans the card, validates it and processes the payment.
“UATP connects airlines to alternative forms of payment brands across the globe; by adding Paymagnet, we enhance our portfolio and are able to offer contactless payments, which is only expected to continue to increase with the recent European mandate that all POS systems must have contactless payment acceptance capability by 2020,” noted Ralph Kaiser, UATP’s president and CEO, in the same release.
