Nigerian mobile payments provider Teasy Mobile is to equip its mobile money agents with POS terminals that use biometric technology to verify a consumer and NFC to allow them to make a payment.

VeriFone Mobile Money, a joint venture between POS maker Verifone and Mobilis Networks that also supplies Tonga's NFC-based Beep and Go mobile money service, will provide Teasy Mobile with its Verifone Mobile Money wallet solution and retail switch. Teasy will also "work closely with local industry players to roll out Verifone contactless POS devices as part of the solution."

Merchants will be using Verifone's VX520 POS system and Teasy will also enable agents to use NFC phones running a merchant app to process payments.

Consumers will be able to make payments using an NFC phone or with an NFC tag, supplied by Israel-based labeling solutions provider Tadbik.

"When paying with a registered Teasy wallet, it's an easy and fast process," Teasy Mobile explained to NFC World. "The merchant keys in the amount of the desired transaction type — purchase, deposit, withdrawal, etc — on the POS terminal. The customer taps the phone on the POS, followed by entering a PIN and it's done."

"Biometric data can be used as an extra [know your customer] requirement for certain transaction values," the company continued.

"We are very excited with the market opportunity this solution will bring us," Teasy's Musa Ali Baba says. "We believe that, while the market is growing quickly for mobile wallets, we will be able to roll out a mixture of point of sale and mobile wallet technology, thus capturing all points at which the customer will transact.

"VeriFone Mobile Money has provided a very advanced yet easy-to-use solution to Teasy that will add value to the Nigeria Cashless Vision and allow for alternative and easier ways to make payments benefiting Nigeria and the industry as a whole, and we are very excited to enter into this partnership."

"Nigeria is a rapidly advancing and sophisticated mobile money market, and there are many mobile wallet providers already in the Nigerian market," adds Chris Jones, CEO at VeriFone Mobile Money.

"With Teasy Mobile, VeriFone Mobile Money will be offering a market first in Nigeria delivering Teasy customers frictionless, fast and secure transactions at the agents' point of sale."