International payment system Visa is working on Soft POS, a project aimed at enabling people to use their smartphones as point-of-sale terminal for contactless payments.

TASS reports that the news has been announced by Visa Russia Country Manager Yekaterina Petelina, who added that five potential vendors are involved in the project.

“The idea is that the phone can work as a terminal. It will make it possible to decrease the cost of the terminal itself and consequently develop payment acceptance in small and micro-businesses as well, which are the types of business where the cost of the terminal is the problem,” she said.


Petelina noted that small businesses are keen to use contactless payments because of high demand on the part of clients and growing competition in the market. At the same time, all parties want the payments to be as safe as before.

Meanwhile, according to Vedomosti, Mastercard and Sberbank launched the pilot version of a similar payment system in December 2018. Sberbank TapOnPhone app allows businesses to accept payments from clients without a terminal, just via the smartphone. In order to join this system, they need to sign an acquiring contract with Sberbank and download the app.

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