A new deal struck by Barclaycard means that new wearable items integrated with bPay contactless payment technology will hit the high street, arriving in the form of watches and jewellery.
Some prominent retailers on the UK high street are involved in the deal, with the likes of Dorothy Perkins and Miss Selfridge set to carry the new contactless lines. These brands follow in the footsteps of Top Shop, another high street store that stocked jewellery embedded with bPay technology.
Barclaycard bPay is a piece of technology housed in a chip which can be integrated into various small devices for efficient payments.
The deal involves DCK Group, a fashion retailer at the core of the industry incorporating the bPay chip with its range of ‘Tutch’ jewellery. The group has connections with 15 retailers in 33 countries, moving 60 million items of jewellery per year.
Watches are also set to hold the bPay technology via Tappy Technologies. Instead of creating an entirely new device to hold the chip, this business incorporates the technology into traditional watches.
Interest in payment technology is mounting, with Airbnb recently announcing the completion of its acquisition of payments start up Tilt, and moving further towards an initiative to revolutionise the booking process.
Despite original bPay devices recording 1.1m transactions, amounting to £6.6m in spending, wearables have not proven to be ground breaking across the board, as Fitbit recently cut 6% of jobs as wearable sales struggled.
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Reported by Finextra, Tami Hargreaves, commercial director of digital consumer payments at Barclaycard said: “Thanks to the huge growth we are seeing in contactless payments, consumers are looking for even more convenience when it comes to paying and these partnerships show how the worlds of fashion and technology can combine to provide consumers with quick, easy and convenient ways of making secure payments for £30 and under.”
