The Financial Blog

Manchester City football club became the first in europe to launch a ‘tap&go’ payment system in it’s stadium for season ticket holders.

MBNA, Manchester City footbal club and Mastercard have worked together to launch Paypass a contactless card which can be used to make payments inside the stadium on match days and gain access to the stadium.

The Manchester City FC Mastercard Prepaid Seasoncard with Paypass will replace the season ticket that supporters currently use. The trial will last until the end of the season with bars and stands in the selected North Stand Level 2, accepting Tap&go payments for purchases under £10. Card holders just tap their card against the PayPass reader, the idea is to reduce queing times, which can only be a good thing!

Manchester City fans can top up their prepaid cards as they would do with a pay as you go mobile phone, they can also use the card anywhere that accepts contactless and Chip & PIN payments where the Mastercard PayPass logos are displayed. Of course City fans can add funds online at www.mcfc.co.uk via PayZone points at retailers or over the phone on 0870 062 1894.

General Manager for MasterCard Northern Europe, John Bushby, said:

“In a European first, a single piece of plastic will enable football fans to gain access to and make payments at their home ground. A tap of your MasterCard PayPass card takes less than 1 second and our extensive experience in US stadiums has already shown the time and cost efficiencies this technology can bring to both fans and onsite retailers, in terms of the speed, convenience and safety of contactless payments, compared to cash.”

There are more than 20 million payments under £10 in the UK every year, worth around £200 million a year. Paypass is a new faster, safer, more convenient alternative to cash payments under £10.

From 1st April 2008 BT are going to stop charging customers for calls to their customer service and helpdesk telephone numbers. Currently the 0870 and 0845 numbers cost customers up to as much as £0.50 per minute, so that’s a staggering £30 for one hours call.

BT managing director consumer, Gavin Patterson, said: “BT has been setting the pace with its pricing and today we’ve decided to go a step further. We’ve always had some of the lowest prices for such calls and now we’ve decided to make them free. We call on the rest of the industry to follow our lead. There really is no excuse for companies whose prices are either sky-high or verging on the ridiculous. We believe that customers are out of pocket to the tune of £70 million a year.”

Main reasons for calling BT technical support
Network connection problems (37%)
Service interruptions (18%)
Set-up problems (16%)
Wireless router problems (11%)
Issues with speed (9%)
Other(9%)

Barclaycard seem to have stolen the show from The Royal Bank of Scotland by announcing that they will be the first to publicly trial contactless mobile phone payments in the UK. Although they haven’t actually given any dates, they’ve just stated ‘Barclaycard is to become the first credit card provider to publicly trial mobile phone payments in the UK.’

The Barclaycard trial will allow selected customers to make contactless payments for £10 or under by touching their mobile phone against a payment terminal.   

Following a successful internal trial, the public trial is being used to assess consumer appetite for new payment methods. Other partners in the trial include O2, Visa Europe, Nokia and Transport for London.

Click here to see the original blog with full details on contactless mobile phone payments

• Over a quarter of broadband users, that’s nearly 4 million, aren’t satisfied with the speed suppliedby their broadband company
• Brits pay for an average speed of 5Mb but receive an average speed of 3Mb
• Of the 77% of households with non-cable broadband lines, 6 out of 10 are incapable of obtaining speeds of 6Mb, or 5 million customers, will only receive a maximum of 2Mb
• 9 million Brits say it is more important than ‘value for money’ when choosing a broadband service
• 25% of broadband uers do not know what speed they have signed up to and 31% don’t know what speed they actually receive
• O2 throws down the gauntlet to broadband firms with first ever ‘speed guarantee’
• Virgin Media focuses on high-speed broadband connections to woo customers

The UK is 17th in the world for broadband speeds; 23 times slower than Japan and five times slower than the French.

This new research from Uswitch.com shows just how bad the situation has become in the UK. We now spend a massive £3.2 billion a year and 33 days per year on broadband.

Head of Communications Services, at uSwitch.com, Steve Weller, said: “The ‘speed demons’ are the broadband companies still willing to let their customers to pay for an advertised broadband speed when they know full well it is impossible for them to receive it.

It’s like selling a Porsche that will only go as fast as a Reliant Robin. Ofcom should go further than simply making suggestions to companies – it should be forcing them to be more transparent. The ASA also has an important role to play in cracking down harder on companies advertising speeds that many customers have no chance of receiving.”

If you like splashing your hard earned cash on the latest gadgets then think again before rushing to the shops or your PC to order the latest models.

According to Fool.co.uk in the UK we leave £23 million worth of gadgets lying about unwanted because we’re all using the latest models. Infact Fool.co.uk says we upgrade our most popular gadgets, on average, every 2 years.

With the new digital TV era 41 per cent of us have abandoned our video and DVD players/recorders. 32 per cent of us have an unwanted mobile phone stashed in our drawers.

27 per cent of 18 to 24 year olds buy the latest gadgets to keep up to date with the latest developments. 21 per cent of men compared to 11 per cent of women are likely to upgrade their gadgets.

Head of Personal Finance at Fool.co.uk, David Kuo, “We’ve tracked some of the top gadgets on the market today and on average, £87.20 has been slashed since a product first launched. If you can hold out until the original hype has died down, you can make some significant savings.

However, if you do find the latest technology too tempting, there are some gadgets that hold their value longer than others, but there are no guarantees they will do so over the long term. Often it can be better to bide your time until the euphoria surrounding the next must-have gadget dies down. The only must-haves you need are long-term financial goals to keep you from being distracted by short-term temptations.”

Fools findings;

This sounds interesting, and I think it’s quite cool too…OK I’m sad for getting excited about things like this.

The Royal Bank of Scotland has today announced it plans to run internal trials with a contactless mobile phone payment system until the end of the year. If the trials are successful they will look to roll out customer trials in early 2008.

The system will be called ‘Tap n Go’ and will revolutionise the way people shop and make their daily debit transactions. The idea is you place your mobile phone on a contactless payment terminal and your transaction is processed in seconds. This will mean that you could buy a coffee or a book without opening your wallet. The payment system will only work for amounts under £10. Very cool, if you ask me!

Chief Executive of Consumer Banking at The Royal Bank of Scotland, Paul Geddes said: “RBS was the first bank in Europe to carry out a public Contactless Card debit payment and we have now repeated this feat with a successful Mobile Phone Contactless debit payment at our Headquarters.  We decided to trial this payment innovation because we think people will really welcome the speed and convenience of reaching for their mobile phone to make a payment, instead of worrying about whether they have enough loose change in their pocket or locating their wallet.  This is yet another example of RBS delivering new and innovative ways for customers to make payments - it’s about speed, safety and convenience.  

“Mobile phones are playing an increasingly important role in our day to day lives.  According to official figures, 80% of UK adults own at least one mobile. As we constantly look for ways to improve customer convenience, we therefore believe that mobile phones will be the next step in the payments evolution.

“What’s more, we think that retailers will welcome Mobile Phone Contactless payments because quicker transaction times equals faster moving queues and ultimately happier customers.”

All sounds good to me, it should, in theory, be much quicker to simply touch your mobile phone against a payment terminal and off you go. It should also make the shops happy because it means less time at the till for their staff and their customers. Speedy shopping and less of our time wasted in queues! I suppose you’d need everyone in the shop to be paying by mobile for it to have any affect – oh well, I still think its cool.

A number of internet auction sites have agreed to amend or include information to help protect people buying from them, following a meeting with the Office of Fair Trading (OFT).

The sites eBay, eBid, CQout, QXL and Tazbar will include advice and links on to inform customers of their rights under the Distant Selling Regulations (DSRs).

In June this year the OFT published the findings of its Internet Shopping market study - Click here to download a copy

The study found that some businesses trading through online auctions were failing to identify themselves as businesses despite 60 per cent of online auction shoppers wanting to know whether they were buying from a business. Shoppers who buy from a business using the ‘buy now’

Head of Internet Shopping Study Team at the OFT, Steve Lisseter, said: ‘We welcome the efforts made by these online auction sites to raise awareness of consumers’ rights, and we are also very encouraged by the work they are doing to ensure that businesses using their sites are fully aware of their legal obligations.’

For further advice on consumer rights when shopping online, contact Consumer Direct on 08454 040506 or visit www.consumerdirect.gov.uk

A study by moneysupermarket.com reveals that 61 per cent of people chose their broadband provider because of the speed on offer. However, the study of 43,000 broadband customers revealed that only 44 per cent of customers receive just half the speed advertised when they signed up, so music and film downloads are taking twice as long.

55 per cent of the population spend 172 hours on average, that’s 7 solid days!, of their free time each year downloading files from the internet. With broadband services this slow customers are surely being ripped off by false advertising? A credit card company could not advertise one rate of interest and simply charge a higher rate so why should broadband providers get away with it?

Rob Barnes, head of broadband and mobiles at moneysupermarket.com, said: “As most people are only achieving half the speed they signed up for, a typical film of 500Mb could take up to four hours to download, instead of 60-90 minutes. If you’re downloading a podcast of 50Mb, you’d expect it to be downloaded within 10 minutes if using an 8Mb line, on speeds less than this you could be waiting up to half an hour.

“As the downloading culture continues to grow, broadband speed becomes even more important. Thankfully, Ofcom has decided to step in and question six of the biggest Internet Service Providers, looking at the speeds they advertise and what people actually receive. From this consultation, providers should be required to give clear, transparent advice on the speeds people will be able to achieve; perhaps providing a test, like O2 broadband, as part of the process when they sign up to a new deal. In the meantime I’d recommend anyone who wants to download large files, such as films, to opt for a connection of 16Mb or faster with unlimited download capabilities. Providers such as Be Broadband, Virgin Media and Sky Broadband all offer this.”

Good advice from Moneysupermarket and roll on the outcome of Ofcom’s questionnaire.

Recent research by Moneysupermarket.com reveals that 94 per cent of all 13 – 15 year olds in the UK have a mobile phone. Even 23 per cent of the 3 – 6 year olds have regular access to a mobile.

In terms of monitoring their children, 76 per cent of parents will only let their kids have a pay-as-you-go mobile phone. Surprisingly only 36 per cent of parents purposely stop their kids from accessing the internet and just 31 per cent bar premium rate telephone numbers.

Only 32 per cent of parents ban downloads like ringtones and wallpaper, surprising since the cost can be a few quid a time…

Head of mobiles at moneysupermarket.com, Rob Barnes said: “Buying a mobile phone for your child can provide peace of mind, as it makes them easily contactable. However, there are a number of factors parents should consider.

“After purchasing the phone, take heed of warnings regarding internet access and look into whether filters can be placed onto your child’s mobile in-order to bar access to specific sites.

“Buying your child a mobile phone is a difficult decision, and I believe there has not yet been enough development in the market to offer sufficient protection. With more children using mobile phones I would like to see more restrictions in place from the networks to prevent them being exploited.”

If you’re looking for a new mobile phone try www.onecompare.com too…

New research by Scottish Widows proves that technology talks for young people these days.  The findings come as Apple launches the new iPhone in the UK, a much sought-after gizmo since its launch in the US earlier this year

According to the research, one in eight people aged between 18 and 35 are more likely to show-off about their latest gadget purchase to proove how well they’re doing rather than telling people about their property, cars, holidays or their designer clothes. In contrast, only 4 per cent of people aged 55 and over use technology to impress people.

It’s no surprise that the younger people questioned admitted they were less inclined to show off about their savings and investments (5%) and pensions (1%) than their latest gadget and gizmo purchases..

Mike Hoban, Customer & Brand Marketing Director of Scottish Widows said: “Far from being proud of real financial assets such as savings and pensions, our findings show we are fast becoming a nation who values high-tech over high-wealth.

“Of course we all love the excitement of new gadgets but it shouldn’t be at the expense of our financial security.  Technology today moves so fast that what’s ‘in’ today will quickly be replaced by the next big thing, but good financial planning will never be obsolete.”