alphyra PAYzone Shortlisted By Transport for London for New Oyster E-Money Project

21 July, 2005 – alphyra PAYzone, the UK’s and Europe’s largest cash acceptance company, with over 120,000 points of sale across 19 European countries, has been shortlisted from 20 companies in the payments industry to partner Transport for London’s (TfL) Oyster e-money project, it was announced today. alphyra will be invited to enter final negotiations this summer and demonstrate its suitability for the project.

The announcement marks TfL’s commitment to extending the use of its successful ticketing and smart card, Oyster, to low value goods and service payments at newsagents, parking machines, fast food restaurants and supermarkets, where the speed and convenience of a sale are important factors. With 2.2 million users in the UK, extending the use of the Oyster card will make smart card payment even more convenient for users.

Jay Walder, Managing Director of Finance and Planning at Transport for London said: "The use of contactless smart cards for low value payments is growing in popularity around the globe. Such schemes are now well established in Hong Kong and Japan and significant trials are taking place in the United States."

With a growing retail estate of over 24,000 PAYzone terminals in the UK, alphyra is well placed to develop the e-money project in conjunction with TfL. PAYzone-branded terminals are already installed in thousands of terminals across the Greater London area. Oyster card users will never be far from a top-up terminal, be it in a convenience store, supermarket or garage, and will be able to charge up the card whenever and wherever they are in the capital.

Rupert Lowery, Managing Director of alphyra UK said: "We look forward to demonstrating the advantages of the PAYzone network in terms of availability, convenience and ease of use. We have the experience and technical expertise to deliver a market-leading e-money solution, as well as the independent retail network infrastructure necessary to offer the convenience and ubiquity of service consumers would expect.

"PAYzone terminals already deliver a host of processing services, including utility payments, mobile phone top-ups and local authority payments. Oyster card users will be able to benefit from being able to carry out multiple transactions in one convenient, secure transaction."


About alphyra and PAYzone
PAYzone is the UK’s number one branded network for payment and collections. PAYzone is powered by alphyra UK, part of Europe’s largest independent solution provider for the processing of electronic products and services. The PAYzone network’s convenience and long opening hours attracts mobile operators, utility companies, content providers and merchants as well as millions of consumers, and delivers increased revenues for retail partners. alphyra (UK) is based in Northwich, Cheshire with offices in Dalgety Bay, Scotland.