The individuals used a specific Nokia handset to make payments at selected retailers, and travel the London Underground with transactions made via Barclays.
O2 has since been in discussions with large retailers, such as Tesco and W. H. Smith, for the deployment of the necessary electronic point of sale units, and with handset manufacturers, such as Apple and Samsung, to enable NFC technology on all future devices.
The Samsung S5230 NFC-enabled handsets contained O2 SIM cards pre-loaded with £55 and a La Caixa Visa Mobile Payment application.
[3] In May 2010 (2010-05), Telefónica Europe began a controlled commercial trial of its NFC service in Plzeň, a city in the Czech Republic.
O2 Money has been described by Ronan Dunne, CEO at O2, as the first step in implementing NFC technology in mobile phones in the United Kingdom.
The application allows users from any UK mobile network to use their smartphone to access money loaded on to a prepaid visa debit card, which is issued electronically when you register.
[11] End of October 2020 Telefónica Germany together with Comdirect (part of Commerzbank) launched a mobile app called O2 Money that provides users with an overview of their finances, includes functions of personal budgeting tool and a listing of all contracts and subscriptions.