Starbucks to support contactless card payments

By UK CreditCards.com

Published: 6 June 2011

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Customers at selected Starbucks stores will soon be able to pay for their coffee with a single swipe of their contactless debit or credit card. The global coffeehouse company has teamed up with Barclaycard to trial contactless payments in several of its British stores next spring.

If successful, the technology could be rolled out across the majority of Starbucks outlets in the UK and Ireland. Pete Blower, technology services manager for Starbucks EMEA, said that the company is "committed" to customer service.

"We're seeing more and more people use cards for payment and contactless will allow us to serve our customers more quickly and with greater ease," he explained in a press release announcing the service.

As of January 2nd 2011, Starbucks had 17,009 stores in more than 50 countries, serving millions of customers every day. With so many people passing through its doors, many of whom are keen to get a takeaway coffee in as short a time as possible, both the company and its customers ought to benefit from the convenience of contactless payment technology.

"Coffee shops are the perfect environment for contactless payments, because so many of their customers are in a rush to get their drink and go," explained Marc Pettican, Barclaycard's sales director of global payment acceptance, explained in a press release. "That Starbucks has decided to introduce contactless is great news for a brand seen as technologically innovative."

See related: Barclaycard and Orange pioneer mobile payments; McDonald's adopts contactless card technology; Survey: Brits reluctant to adopt contactless cards