Nokia and Visa test mobile payment

Nokia and Visa are the latest twosome to climb aboard the NFC bandwagon, giving credit card users in Malaysia a chance to pay for goods with their phones.

Visa will be installing 2,500 Visa Wave readers -- which can deduct payment from a user's credit card when an NFC phone linked to the account is pressed against it -- across the country and enlisting 200 guinea pigs in Kuala Lumpur to try out the technology.

The trial will run for four months and, if it proves successful, may spark a full commercial rollout. A similar technology is already in use in Japan, where local mobile operator NTT DoCoMo has launched its own credit card brand, iD, which enables consumers to pay for items with their 'wallet phones'.

Currently just one Nokia model is available with the Visa Wave service, the 3220, which is equipped with contactless technology using an NFC 'shell'.

Risto Sitila, Nokia's head of consumer solutions for the Asia Pacific region, said that Malaysia had been chosen to host the experiment as it is an "advanced" payments market, unlike Europe.

"Europe is a bit behind in contactless. But you never know; there might be something happening in the future," he said. 

Europe's only commercial rollout of NFC to date is in the German city of Hanau, where commuters use the technology to pay for their bus fares.

A major trial is taking place in the French city of Caen.