Barclaycard, part of Barclays Retail and Business Banking, has launched a new way for UK customers to pay with their mobile phones. It’s called Barclaycard PayTag and is effectively a small NFC credit card that can be stuck to the back of a mobile handset. The sticker will operate as an additional card on a Barclaycard customer’s existing account.

PayTag will be offered free to existing Barclaycard Visa cardholders. A group of customers will be invited to use the service before it’s rolled out as an option for all UK Barclaycard customers later this year. Each PayTag card is around a third of the size of a normal credit card and incorporates the usual security measures for contactless payments, offering a maximum transaction value of £15 without entering a PIN. (The figure rises to £20 in June).

David Chan, CEO of Barclaycard Consumer Europe, said “Today, we are offering the choice of mobile payments to millions of our customers at no additional cost to them. More than half of us say that the item we’re most lost without is our mobile phone, so we’re giving people the option of using them to make easy, convenient, everyday payments without the need to upgrade their current handset. Barclaycard is developing a wide range of initiatives which will ultimately enable everyone to enjoy the benefits of mobile payments. Barclaycard PayTag is another milestone on our journey to make paying easier, and sits alongside other easy ways to pay with your mobile such as those we offer in partnership with Orange.”

Visa predicts the number of contactless point-of-sale terminals in the UK will rise by 50% this year to 150,000.

A similar hybrid system using MasterCard’s NFC technology was announced earlier this year by BOKU.