Pay-by-phone vending machines soon to debut

Imagine you run out of your office to buy food from a vending machine only to find you have left your wallet on your desk.

Starting from May 2002, this will not be a problem for stressed out employees, provided they have a mobile phone in hand and live in Tallinn, because the machine will receive payment by phone.

Using such additional GSM services in this type of situation is a Scandinavian trend now spreading to other parts of Europe.

Beginning next month several vending machines located in corporate facilities will be able to receive payment via a phone call thanks to technology being introduced by Estomatic OU, an Estonian company which sells machines produced by Italian, Dutch, American and British firms.

In the coming two years, the company hopes to introduce around 200 machines selling newspapers, food, drinks and other products.

The system is simple for the end user. He or she selects the product, dials the number written on the machine, the desired goods pop out and the charge is added to the client's mobile phone bill.

During trials last year the service was available only at one vending machine on the premises of the mobile phone company EMT.

But now it is being extended to clients of all three Estonian mobile phone networks.

"At the moment vending machines use coins or special magnetic cards, and in the future the old way of paying for your coffee will remain," said Priit Vimberg, chief executive of Estomatic OU.

Possible uses for the terminals include the sale of public transportation tickets although this idea was recently put on hold by the Tallinn city administration.

Estomatic, founded in 1997, operates all over Estonia and opened a branch in Riga in 2000.

EMT has pioneered technical innovations such as the launch in May of the mobile positioning system (MPS) and the introduction of payment for parking via mobile phone text message in July 2000.

EMT plans to develop the latter service in other cities around Europe, said company spokeswoman Kaja Pino.

Providing such services may not be profitable in themselves but serve to increase customer satisfaction and loyalty, Pino explained.

"Giving additional value to people using mobile phones is much more important," she said.

"It is about human fantasy. A phone can act as a wallet in any situation when a person used to need a small amount of money."

EMT is determined to make a success of paying for public transport via mobile phones, she added.