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Furthermore, the Financial Times is reporting that PayPal is interested in Zoosh — and it’s easy to see why.

Once the customer has selected an account to both receive and make payments from, Commbank Kaching will enable them to pay anyone via MasterCard PayPass, an email address, phone number or Facebook friendship.

Depending on the format selected for payment, the transaction will either take place instantly, or generate a unique code for delivery to the recipient, allowing them to access their payment online at a convenient time.

Users wishing to activate the NFC functionality will need to use an iCarte cover - billed as an interim technology by the bank - which is available for purchase during the app installation process.

"Mobile and online social payment is the next step in transaction technology," says Lindberg.

Now, for the first time, Australian consumers will no longer have to rely on cash or cards to make payments to family, friends or even businesses.

Though its potential capabilities border infinity, right now everyone is obsessed with NFC as a form of contact-less payment.

Currently, the primary goal of NFC seems to be ridding the world of plastic credit cards, stacks of loyalty cards and paper coupons.

The release of Google Wallet heralds a new age of consumer spending.

A simple wave of the phone pays for your purchase.

Google Wallet’s SingleTap feature allows for the seamless transfer of coupons, loyalty cards and payment information in one simple tap.

The New Jersey transit system just partnered with Google Wallet to allow commuters to pay fares with phones.

The jointly owned company, Wireless Payment Services, aims to standardize and commercialize an easy-to-use mobile phone payment system. The carriers declined to say how much they're spending on the initiative.

The announcement is the latest example of Canada's wireless providers joining forces to push potentially revolutionary technology.

It's also further evidence that cellphones are moving way beyond their traditional use and into music playing, gaming, Internet and other applications.

Consumers should expect to see some changes starting next summer.

Prepaid wireless users will be affected first. The aim is to allow them to use their phones to buy more account minutes instead of having to visit a merchant.

After that, the carriers want to gradually roll out the system at retail points of sale and service centres like ticketing outlets.

"What the user will be able to do, ultimately, is to tap or wave their mobile device in front of a point-of-sale terminal to pay," said Jeff Chorlton, president of Wireless Payment Services.

Payment will be withdrawn from the user's bank account or charged to a credit card.

"All of your payment methods could be contained on your cellphone," Chorlton said.

Many handset makers have begun trials to add a payment function to their cellphone product lines. Payment works through a short-range wireless technology called near-field communication. NFC lets users exchange information securely by bringing two electronic devices close together.

The technology could forever alter consumer lifestyles, predicts the NFC Forum, an industry group promoting the technology founded in 2004 by Nokia Corp., Royal Philips Electronics and Sony Corp.

The Forum offers this future scenario on its website: "With Near Field Communication enabled devices, you will make your travel reservations on your PC and download your tickets to your mobile phone or PDA, just by bringing it next to the computer. Then you will check in for your trip by touching your hand-held device to the departure gate kiosk - no paper, no printing."

The system will allow retailers and other companies to save money, Chorlton said. "For some merchants, it could represent the roll-out of infrastructure at very low cost because the infrastructure largely exists through hand-held devices."

Mobile users in such places as Hong Kong and Finland are already using NFC technology to hop on a bus or buy some new threads. Canadians should take to wireless payment because they already frequently use cashless commerce like debit cards, said Dennis Kira, an e-commerce specialist at Concordia University.

"In my mind, the public in general is ready for it."

Canada has about 16 million mobile phone subscribers.

The partners are also looking to add support for loyalty programs and vending machine purchases.

The system is designed to work with an NFC-enabled SIM cards as a secure element, or with Gemalto’s Gemalto’s Upteq N-Flex NFC solution, which can turn standard mobile phones into NFC-enabled devices.

Much like Apple with iTunes, Facebook takes a 30 percent cut on every dollar spent through the Credits platform.

Today users can buy Credits with 15 currencies, including U.S. dollars, Euros, the British Pound and the Venezuelan Bolivar.

It is important to first highlight, that for any mobile payments system to work, consumers will need to open some form of application to allow users to connect the phone to complete the payment. 

To date, Facebook sees over 200 million unique users accessing the social network through a mobile devices each month.

Almost all of the major brands who would adopt mobile payments in the beginning (i.e. Best Buy, Gap, Target) have invested heavily into growing a Facebook presence. It is this ability to connect to users and their social graph through a Facebook payment option that makes Credits and mobile payments an attractive model.

From this point, it is Facebook’s network that makes its payment option so attractive. As I scan my phone to finalize my purchase, I am presented with the option to share this purchase with my friends. Selecting yes, opens up an additional discount for my friends and I. From there my friends have the option to use the promotion through Best Buy’s ecommerce page or on location.

For now, Facebook prefers to play down talk of its broader ambitions for Credits. The 30 percent tax Facebook imposes on those who accept Credits might be too high to allow for the regular sale physical goods and services.

Other big players include PayPal who has more than 81 million active registered accounts and 210 million accounts, in 190 markets and it supported 24 currencies.

One factor that is definite is the speed at which small business will adapt mobile transactions.

Probably an even bigger player is Apple and its 100 million iTunes users. The iPhone is set to be the main phone to drive mobile payments, even if other phones offer these features. But one thing is for sure: the mobile (social) payments market will be fragmented for the first few years and Facebook is easily in the position to come out victorious.

While analysts feel 2011 is the year for mobile payments, there is still uncertainty of how quickly consumers will move their wallet to a digital format or what platform they will use. 

Google, with its Google Checkout and Android phones is also set to be a big player. With NFC technology being implemented on all future Google phones, we expect a mobile payment app preloaded on these phones. 

Third-party companies such as Bling Nation and Square to name a few win over merchants by cutting the transaction process fee by as much as 50 percent. With consumers swiping their debits cards more so than ever, this is a huge savings for any company.

Additionally, the three major U.S wireless carriers, Verizon Wireless, AT&T and T-Mobile partnered with Discover Card to form a mobile payment company called “Isis,” a venture to provide mobile payment carrier billing solution for payments.

The closet form of mobile payments in the U.S. that can be utilized nationally is the Starbucks digital gift card. 

While this option only applies to Starbucks stores, consumers can now makes purchases by scanning their phones.

The biggest challenge, currently keeping mobile payments from going mainstream is technology adoption. 

Not only do consumers need to carry a phone that has the correct technology, retailers also need to implement technology that connects with the phone.

Other challenges that could cause slow growth are the number of companies attempting to break into the space. 

From small start-ups to large tech companies such as Google and Apple, many consumers could be slow to adopt as they wait it out and see which platform becomes widely adopted.

To truly accelerate growth, we believe a large company needs to step up and look at the opportunity as a way to break into the $6.2 trillion retail market by covering the costs of technology adoption.

One player who is seen to have this ability is Apple. 

As the largest tech company in the world, rumors have come up, that Apple will implement NFC technology into the next generation iPhone 5 and with 100 million users already connected through iTunes, giving away the retail technology to scan mobile payments could be a quick way to gain accelerated usage.

Though it cannot be applied to all of your purchases, Starbucks seems to be the furthest along, allowing customers to purchase digital gift cards that can be scanned at all Starbuck locations nationwide.

To help accelerate growth, implementing a rewards program will draw more consumers to try the new payment platform.  This option to collect and track rewards is one of the key features that have helped Starbucks see quicker adoption.

Isis, which was formed through a partnership involving AT&T, Verizon Wireless, and T-Mobile USA, is attempting to enter the mobile payments business at a busy time. Google has already launched Google Wallet, although it remains limited to one smartphone on Sprint Nextel, and is only compatible with merchants with newer payment terminals. Visa, meanwhile, is attempting to create its own digital wallet. American Express, which has expressed a preference to partner, on Monday said it would invest $100 million in start-ups devoted to digital payments.

The approach that Isis is taking is wholly different from Google. Isis is working on a neutral platform that serves as a foundation for other parties such as retailers, credit card issuers and payment networks, who can plug in and offer their own services to their customers. Isis doesn't access any of the customer data. Abbott said it is working with a number of different business models, including charging a rental fee to use the platform, or possibly taking a cut of each transaction. The hope is the platform is valuable enough of a tool that companies will be willing to pay to use it.

That's a wholly different approach than Google Wallet, which is largely controlled by Google. Under that model, Google is providing the payment services to retailers, payment networks and banks for free. But in exchange, it gets access to the customer's data, enabling the company to deliver targeted ads.

"Free is a price I can't afford," he said, was a common expression among the companies he talks to.

Isis started off slowly but has had a few significant announcements in the recent months. The venture managed to strike deals with the four major payment networks: Visa, MasterCard, American Express and Discover, which was the first to sign up with ISIS.

Its plans are for a trial to begin next year in Salt Lake City and Austin, Texas. Abbott said he wasn't worried that Isis was falling behind Google's own initiative.

Abbott is less concerned about timing because much of the infrastructure is still moving into place. Phones and merchant terminals need a technology called near-field communications to talk with each other. There are few terminals with the necessary NFC chip, and even fewer phones. The Nexus S is one of the few NFC-enabled devices, and is positioned as Google's flagship phone for Google Wallet. The upcoming Galaxy Nexus will also have NFC, as well as a number of other handsets including BlackBerrys.

ISIS is focused on building out the system, improving the customer experience, and making sure all of its partners will be ready. That includes the carriers, handset manufacturers, payment networks, banks and retailers, who all must be able to handle or direct a customer complaint if something goes wrong.

"We absolutely want to get out fast, but we won't put out anything until it's ready," he said. "The customer experience is infinitely more important than speed."

American Express recently took the spotlight when the company signed a deal with Verizon Wireless allowing mobile users to make purchases on Verizon devices using a streamlined process. As the largest U.S. wireless carrier, Verizon reaches a broad audience. The partnership comes at the right time as American Express opens its own digital payment software called Serve, which will come pre-installed on all Verizon smartphones and tablets.

In an apparent bid to boost sales of Android phones, Google launched Google Wallet, a mobile payment platform for Android users. How it works: Google's Android platform will support NFC technology (more on that in a minute) capable of turning your phone into your wallet, letting you store digital credit cards on your Google Wallet account. Just walk into a store, pick up a product, and tap your phone on the payment reader. Google's service will support the payment networks of Citigroup's (NYSE: C  ) Citi, MasterCard (NYSE: MA  ) , and First Data.

eBay's (Nasdaq: EBAY  ) PayPal has dominated the online payment space for over a decade, but as the competition gets tough and the focus shifts to mobile devices, the company will need to make big moves to maintain its head start. One such move was initiating Titanium+Commerce, a mobile payment program that lets small businesses design their own smartphone apps for processing PayPal transactions.

Another emerging competitor in the mobile payments space is ISIS, a mobile commerce network founded as a coalition among AT&T (NYSE: T  ) , Verizon Wireless, and T-Mobile. Similar to Google Wallet, ISIS will run on any NFC-enabled device offered by the three carriers. Payment network partners will include American Express, Discover, MasterCard, and Visa (NYSE: V  ) .

Why this will workFor one thing, smartphones have conquered dozens of industries by gradually replacing everyday items like pocket calendars, road maps, and cameras with their ever-evolving apps. I have no doubt the move to mobile payments will quickly make credit cards a thing of the past. Who will finish the race with the most market share? The company that can get the most merchants to adopt its service. At this point, ISIS shows the most promise because merchants will benefit from a solution offering multiple wireless carriers.

Around 45 million people in the UK use a mobile phone, and 49% of mobile users surveyed use their device to purchase products at least once every three months. But there is still a big demand for in-store purchases too, as we saw with London’s Oxford Street retailers gearing up for Christmas by introducing a number of tech initiatives to help capitalize on the growing m-commerce trend.

So the real prediction here is that the uptake of mobile payment technology will increase significantly over the next 4 years – something that most people would probably agree with. But at the rate we’re currently going at, and with the likes of NFC technology gaining momentum in the micro-payment sphere, cash could be under threat sooner than we may otherwise have realized.

“We’ll see a huge change over the next few years in the way we shop and pay for things”, says Carl Scheible, Managing Director of PayPal UK. “By 2016, you’ll be able to leave your wallet at home and use your mobile as the 21st century digital wallet. Our vision of money is to enable you to pay for something from wherever you are, whatever device you’re on – a PC, mobile phone, tablet, games console and a whole lot more.”

Indeed, Scheible continued by saying that it will take another 4 years before we’ll see the real beginning of money’s digital switchover in the UK, but he stopped short of any discussion relating to a ‘cashless society’. “We’re not saying cash will disappear entirely, but we’ll increasingly use our phones and other devices rather than our wallets to pay in-store as well as online”, he says. “The lines between the online world and high street will soon disappear altogether. Children born today will become the UK’s first ‘cashless generation’. It will be completely natural for them to pay by mobile.”

PayPal’s findings are based on interviews by Forrester Consulting with 10 senior executives from major UK retailers and other businesses, with a combined turnover of £85bn.

By 2016, it’s thought that UK mobile retail sales will hit £2.5bn. PayPal currently has over 14m active UK accounts, over a million of which have been used to send a mobile payment. Around the world, PayPal expects to process more than $3.5bn (£2.25bn) in mobile payments this year, five times more than in 2010.

Brian Waring, VP of marketing and category for Starbucks in the UK, says: “There’s no doubt that mobile payments are going to be the future of shopping, but it’s not clear how it’s going to develop. We just didn’t want to wait. Ours is so simple and it enhances the whole experience for customers.”

It introduced the option in the US in early 2011 and claims 20 million payments have been made using the technology in its 6,800 US stores.UK customers will also be able to use the app in international Starbucks stores that offer the capability as it updates to give the cash balance in the local currency.

developers continue to chase after our elusive social graph to make geolocation as indispensable as microblogging and photo sharing.

RFID (radio-frequency identification) and NFC (near field communication) technologies are going to become much more popular as geolocation apps continue to evolve and developers look for ways to make sending and receiving location-based data easier.

Foursquare has already begun testing NFC check-ins and Coca-Cola used RFID at last year’s Coca-Cola Village teen camp to enable Facebook Likes and status updates to be sent with wristbands.

What Else Can We Expect? There are some exciting innovations emerging in geolocation already, but there’s surely much more value to be had from this technology. Some of the developments I’m most interested to see are: A collection of user-generated information about a place, like a location-based Wikipedia Mobile check-in for flights, bypassing the long check-in counter queues Mobile check-in at doctors’ offices, sending the secretary an automatic notification of your arrival Mobile identification, providing entry to adult-only venues like nightclubs (our phones are already replacing cash, so why not our photo IDs?) Digital, geotagged nightclub stamps to prove you’ve paid to get in Bookmarking for places with push notifications, so you’ll finally remember to check out that café your friend keeps recommending Interactive maps attached to promotional material (with QR codes?) so you can easily find the new pizza place that sent you coupons in the mail

The JV will be an infrastructure for payments, but it won’t process any payments. This will be down to each operator, working with their individual partners, it seems.

It also looks like the first products of this JV will be about advertising rather than NFC payments. Again, Dunne: “NFC is gong to take a little more time, but between the three of us we buy considerable amounts of handsets and [handset makers have] been looking for someone to put their hand up and embrace NFC in a big way.” On advertising, it looks like the idea will be to use the platform to launch campaigns, targeting the subscriber bases of all three operators. In both services, users will be able to opt in and opt out of services.

Merchants can administer reward and loyalty programs more efficiently if they're managed through phones rather than on rubber-stamped cards.

Merchants can deliver location- and time-specific coupons if they are acquainted with a customer's phone.

Merchants can dynamically steer customers to their best payment option.

it's our data that we'll be giving up in exchange for being on the receiving end of those benefits listed above

He said the benefits are obvious when splitting a check at a restaurant, divvying up rent and utilities among five roommates every month, or being the person who fronts the money to buy tickets to a concert for a group of 10. Those transactions today are largely conducted with cash and checks.

American Express is also experimenting with using social networks by creating a Facebook application called “Pay Me Fool,” which uses humor as a way to make it more comfortable for someone to bug a friend to pay them back for beers last weekend.

But right now, Messenger and the other participants on yesterday’s panel agreed on one thing: NFC is still about three years away from hitting the mainstream. It will take a while for users to get NFC-enabled phones and for retailers to have NFC-enabled payment terminals.