RBC, Visa and Rogers Wireless have come together for the next phase of the mobile phone payment pilot, which will allow Canadians the flexibility to make purchases securely at the point of sale with a wave of their mobile phone. The customer phase of the mobile phone payment pilot is expected to launch in mid-2009, following a brief employee pilot. Pilot participants will be issued specially-equipped mobile phones that can simply be waved at Visa payWave-enabled checkout readers at select retail stores and quick-service restaurants in Toronto’s downtown core.

As part of the pilot, Motorola mobile phones outfitted with Near Field Communication (NFC) contactless chips will enable customers to make purchases using the Visa payWave feature just as they would with a contactless RBC Visa card. The functions tested in the pilot will include the secure delivery and storage of account information to the mobile phone and the security of mobile payments at retailers.

The pilot will be the first in Canada to test secure over-the-air (OTA) delivery of mobile payment software and credit card information to a customer’s mobile phone. Gemalto, who currently produce RBC Visa chip cards, will manage the transfer of credit card information from RBC to the secure SIM card in the Rogers Wireless NFC-enabled mobile phone.

Supported by Visa’s mobile payment platform, pilot activities will allow RBC, Rogers and Visa to better understand customer behaviours and their perceptions of the payment experience before the service is provided to consumers.