Visa Europe is to launch its digital wallet service, V.me, to consumers in the UK, Spain and France in Autumn 2012, the payments giant has announced.
The wallet will provide an online repository for credit or debit cards that shoppers can use to make online payments without sharing their card details with the website operator. For the system to work, retailers and e-commerce sites will need to support the V.me service.
Mariano Dima, Visa Europe’s VP of product and marketing solutions, said the new service "sits at the heart of Visa’s future of payments".
"For the first time, consumers and retailers will have a streamlined online checkout experience through an acceptance mark that offers industry-leading security and, when a Visa card is used in a V.me wallet, the same protection and rights that come with any Visa card transaction," Dima said.
Interesting Links
Visa is partnering with payments processor Worldpay to provide the wallet service in the UK, and said it would be announcing other launch partners soon.
The launch has been significantly delayed. Visa Europe originally said it aimed to bring V.me to the public in early 2012.
Visa is also one of mobile telecommunications provider O2’s new mobile wallet service, O2 Wallet. Unveiled last week, O2 Wallet includes the option to use a Visa pre-paid account to make mobile payments.
