Tag: vocalink

Mobile payments deal reached in Thailand with VocaLink

| October 15, 2015

The company from the U.K. has now connected itself with the interbank payments network in the Asia Pacific Country

VocaLink, from the United Kingdom, has now signed an exclusive letter of intent with Thailand’s interbank payments network operator, National ITMX, in order to look into the development of a mobile payments system that would function over real time within the APAC nation.

VocaLink is the company behind the operation of the Faster Payments rails in the U.K., among other projects.

Under the Zapp brand, the company will also be launching a national “Pay by bank” mobile payments app in the U.K., with the support of that country’s banks. The architecture for the Faster Payments system has already been implemented in Singapore, where it is the foundation for the Fast payments service in that country. Now, VocaLink will collaborate with NITMX in order to offer real time smartphone transaction services to merchants, banks, and consumers, built on an instant payment capability platform based on the ISO20022 standard.

National ITMX selected VocaLink as a mobile payments partner due to its strong and extensive history.

thailand mobile paymentsThe managing director of National ITMX, Wanna Notarbhorn, explained that “We chose VocaLink as a key partner because of their proven track record in the delivery of both the UK Faster Payments Service and Singapore’s ISO20022 FAST real-time payments systems. We believe they are best placed to help us identify options for delivering efficient and reliable mobile payments services in Thailand.”

From the time of the Faster Payments program launch in the United Kingdom in 2008, the system has processed more than 4 billion secure transactions. The VocaLink managing director of strategy, products, marketing and business development, Paul Stoddard, stated that this experience in the United Kingdom is a direct reflection of the benefits offered through real time tech throughout the payments sector and into the broader economy.

The mobile payments partnership between the two companies was first announced in Singapore at the international Sibos conference. That event placed smartphone based transactions under an important spotlight when it came to worldwide introduction and adoption by businesses and consumers alike.

Mobile payments company, Zapp, wants to take on the giants

| November 8, 2013

This startup has launched in the United Kingdom and is already targeting 20 million users in the next 4 years.

Zapp, a mobile payments company in the United Kingdom, has vowed that it will reach 20 million users by the close of the year 2017, which would bring them to a size in which they would be considered a rival to more traditional giants in the transaction industry, such as Visa or MasterCard, by the time the decade is done.

This service was implemented earlier this year by VocaLink with the goal of boosting real time transactions.

The purpose was to bring the Zapp mobile payments, in real time, to the in-store experience, as well as online and through apps. This would help to boost the smartphone based experience both over m-commerce as well as in brick and mortar shops in the United Kingdom. It was accomplished through the integration of its system into banking applications and by using the Faster Payments rail taps.

Zapp is currently on the cusp of solidifying mobile payments deals with as many as three large banks in the United Kingdom.


Those institutions would, in turn, invite their own customers to choose to take part in the service once it is officially rolled out in the second half of 2014.

The customers who opt into this mobile payments service would be able to pay for their products and services by using their banking app, bypassing the need to use the traditional card networks. This system, according to Zapp, is even more secure and convenient than other options that are currently available to consumers as they don’t need to provide the retailer or merchant with any of their card data. Instead, there is a token that lasts for only a few moments and has no intrinsic value, but that provides the authorization for the payment request. This is passed from the retailer to Zapp, and then onward to the bank of the customer.

Especially in the case of in-store purchases, Zapp explained that the lengthy log-in requirements that are currently used by some banks for their apps access could make the process unappealing for consumers. However, Zapp allows the same bank to be used while overcoming that issue through “adaptive authentication”, which reduces the barriers for smaller sized mobile payments.