Mobile payment company iZettle, which launched its plug-in ‘chip card’ reader and associated mobile payment app in Sweden last year, has now launched a beta version of its service in Denmark, Finland and Norway. The first 5,000 chip-card readers in each country will be available free of charge.
The service enables anyone with an iPhone or iPad to take credit or debit card payments at any time. Buyers can also share purchase details via Facebook.
There’s no set-up fee, monthly subscription or minimum payment. Instead, each transaction using iZettle is charged 2.75% of the sale plus €0.15 (around 13p). Payments are received by the seller during the following business day.
iZettle is Europay, MasterCard and Visa (EMV) approved and is compliant with the Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard (PCI-DSS).
Mats Taraldsson, the MasterCard executive who heads market development for the Nordic and Baltic region, said “iZettle brings us all one step closer to a world beyond cash. Chip cards are the standard today in most of the world. In just six months iZettle has proven there’s real need and demand for a mobile chip card payment solution that is safe, simple and smart”.
We spoke to iZettle CEO and co-founder Jacob de Geer at Mobile World Congress this morning, where he told us that iZettle had grown the point-of-sale market in Sweden by around 15% since it launched. He also said it was “highly likely” that the UK was the next country for Zettle’s planned expansion.
| We’ll be broadcasting the full interview with Jacob de Geer in one of our special Mobile World Congress podcasts this week. Click here to subscribe free on iTunes, click here for our RSS feed or listen to the whole series of MWC broadcasts, which started on Monday. |