Is the World Ready for Proximity Payments?

Alorie Gilbert reports in Silicon.com on 'wave and go' credit card payments.

The goal of the Us-wide launch is to build a critical mass of both PayPass cardholders and retailers, said MasterCard vice president Murdo Munro. But if the Orlando trial is any indication, MasterCard faces a classic chicken-and-egg dilemma: consumers are unlikely to take an interest in PayPass unless enough retailers support the system, and retailers are reluctant to invest in PayPass equipment until enough customers use the cards.

Several McDonald's store managers that participated in the Orlando trial expressed disappointment in the technology because so few customers had used it. Chung Tran, a manager of one Orlando McDonald's, said he'd seen PayPass used only about three times during the past year. "People are always asking what the heck it is," Tran said of the PayPass reader.