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The financial-services arm of France-based Carrefour Group plans to deploy as many as 4,600 contactless-payment terminals in its hypermarkets and other stores by the end the year, the latest details to emerge about the retailer's push into contactless. Carrefour's Société des Paiements, or PASS, subsidiary earlier had said it would issue 2.5 million payment contactless cards supported by MasterCard Worldwide's PayPass application by the end of the year. Frédéric Mazurier, a PASS director, confirmed the 2.5 million figure for MasterCard-branded cards, which would shift the subsidiary's card portfolio from Visa. Speaking at the Pay Forum conference in Paris this week, Mazurier said Carrefour wants to become the first significant issuer and acquirer of contactless payment in France. Contactless would reduce transaction time and cash handling for the retailer and clear the way for mobile payments and couponing using phones with Near Field Communication technology. Carrefour, which bills itself as Europe's largest retailer and second in the world after United States-based Wal-Mart Stores Inc., runs hypermarkets, or supercenters, along with supermarkets and convenience and discount stories in Europe, Asia and Latin America. The retailer would deploy contactless readers at 1,000 point-of-sale terminals in its hypermarkets in France, Mazurier says. While significant, it represents only about 8% of the 12,000 terminals in Carrefour's more than 200 hypermarkets in France, a source tells CardLine Global sister publication Cards&Payments. The retailer would continue the rollout next year. Plans also call for rolling out as many as 3,000 contactless terminals in Carrefour's Champion and other supermarkets this year, along with equipping 600 terminals in convenience stores, Mazurier said, declining to elaborate. Carrefour owns 60% of the PASS subsidiary, with the other 40% partly owned by French bank BNP Paribas. MasterCard also is involved with a contactless card launch scheduled soon by Carrefour rival Auchan Group, which, like Carrefour, is an issuer and acquirer of payment cards. French supermarket chain Intermarché Group is planning to issue and acquire MasterCard-branded contactless cards as well, perhaps as early as April. The retailers are moving faster than French banks on issuing contactless payment cards. André-Jacques Selezneff, business leader for advanced payments for MasterCard Europe, says PayPass helped MasterCard capture the Carrefour PASS business from Visa, but he declined to go into details. MasterCard did not win the business from Carrefour or the other merchants by subsidizing terminals, he said.
