In the latest of our daily previews of our Awards finalists, we take a look at the nominees in the Most Effective Mobile Payment Solution.

Fonix – Tastecard Payments
Tastecards exclusive members programme offers consuemrs discounts on food in over 6,500 restaurants across the UK, with its 3m members spending in excess of £600m annually in bars and restaurants who have signed up.

Working with Fonix, the programme implemented carrier billing as a new, frictionless payment method for members to pay for the Tastecard subscription, and also implemented a test and learn campaign to find the best pricing strategy for generating revenues.

The split-testing approach helped the programme to identify the best conversion rates and overall revenue strategy for future campaigns, and the introduction of carrier billing reduced cart abandonment rates and raised new monthly memberships.

Bango – Direct Carrier Billing for Google Play in India
India is the worlds second largest smartphone market, but has less than three per cent credit card penetration, limiting customers ability to purchase mobile content and services. In addition, strict privacy regulations and taxation laws have made India a notoriously difficult market to launch payment routes in.

Bangos direct carrier billing for Google Play represents the first time users in India have been able to purchase content from the Google Play store and charge the cost direct to their phone bill, enabling millions of subscribers to purchase apps, books, music, games and more for the first time.

The company has invested significantly to build one of the most reliable mobile payment services in the world, with improved data security and carrier billing tokenisation used to protect users and ensure customer privacy.

With the India mCommerce market expected to expand from $2bn (£1.6bn) in 2014 to $19bn by 2019, Bango is aiming to disrupt the Indian mobile sector and establish itself as an early leader in direct carrier billing.

Camelot and Barclays – National Lottery Payment with Barclays Pingit
Working in partnership with Barclays, Camelot wanted to launch an innovative payment experience for The National Lottery that allows for quick, simple and secure purchases from customers mobiles via the Pingit app. Using Barclays platform, Camelot was able to deliver a pay and play system for both National Lottery tickets and Instant Win Games.

Research by Barclays found that 68 per cent of consumers who had attempted to make purchases on mobile had abandoned their journey due to complex processes or concerns over security, so special attention was given to creating a system that was simple, but secure.

The system is the first new payment option for The National Lottery in more than 10 years, and the first major merchant on Pingit to integrate registration, blending mobile payments with mobile identity within the banking app.

Since its launch, first time and overall conversion rates have significantly improved, with very positive consumer feedback over the ease with which users can now play The National Lottery on their mobile.

Mahindra Comviva – mobiquity Money
Mahindra Comvivas mobiquity Money aims to leverage mobile technology to bring the financially underserved into the formal financial mainstream, creating cashless economies across the globe and providing a new wave of consumers with ways to save, borrow, transfer and spend money.

Built around a Stored Value Account, the solution enables customers to pay bills, make in-store payments and send or receive money via a mobile phone, and also provide users with access to micro-financial services such as savings, loans and insurance. The system is open to businesses and governments wishing to credit salaries or distribute benefit payments.

The companys solution powers 65 mobile money services in more than 45 countries, and is one of the largest mobile money platforms in the world, serving 75m consumers and processing 200m transactions a month, totaling $4bn. The service helps consumers avoid fees they might otherwise face at traditional banks, and access micro-loans to meet emergencies.

The solution helps pay 66,000 civil servants in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, and is used to deliver salaries to the Afghan National Police in remote areas. In Malawi, in passed on NGO aid payments to over 50,000 people, and when Zimbabwe adopted the dollar following an economic crisis, mobiquity Money helped solve the cash crisis, with 47 per cent of the countrys GDP now flowing via its infrastructure.

Mobile Commerce – MCOM Payout Service
The MCOM Payout Service was originally created to solve an internal problem within the company – getting disbursement funds to people quickly and efficiently, regardless of whether they had a bank account or not. The system that was developed with the Post Office has grown far beyond its original use and is now used by Mobile Commerces clients to send funds to their customers quickly and easily.

Nearly 2m adults in the UK do not have bank accounts, with low income households almost four times more likely than average to lack banking. The MCOM Payout Service works via SMS, ensuring maximum coverage, with a postal version designed to cover the remaining seven per cent of the UK population with a mobile phone.

Using a barcode ID system, users can access cash at Post Office branches, even without a bank account. The system averages over £50,000 per week in small denomination payments, with around 1,000 transactions per day, and a total of over £3m paid out so far in 2016.

The system is offered to companies in a variety of packages, enabling businesses to tailor their usage to their needs, with full customer support and customisable SMS messaging enabling firms to build their brand as they make payments.

Our Award winners will be announced at the Awards Ceremony in London on 17 November. To book a seat or table, head for the Awards website or call John Owen on 07769 674824.