In an exclusive deal for MasterCard Worldwide, Indigo Books & Music Inc.’s plans to deploy terminals that accept the card brand’s PayPass contactless payments in all its stores marks the first such development for a retailer of its kind.
Indigo is the largest book and music retailer in Canada with 96 superstores and 151 smaller stores. Previously, primarily only drugstores and fast-food restaurant chains in Canada had opted to install the contactless-payment terminals on a large scale because the transaction speed helps get customers through lines faster, according to David Orzel, a MasterCard spokesperson, contending contactless transactions are about 15 seconds faster than traditional card-based purchases.
Indigo similarly is hoping to reduce customer waits in store lines. Companywide, Indigo has installed 1,000 terminals that accept contactless transactions initiated only with MasterCard PayPass cards. Every checkout station in Indigo stores now has one.
“Eventually we hope this will be ubiquitous so people can spend less time in [lines] and more time in the things that are important in life,” Orzel said.
Virtually all Canadian MasterCard customers’ cards are equipped with PayPass-compatible chips, he said, because of the country’s move toward EMV chip-and-PIN technology.
Executives at Indigo could be reached for comment, but in a press release Kay Brekken, the company’s chief financial officer, said PayPass would bring greater convenience for Indigo’s customers.
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