MasterCard and P97 to offer pump, pay, and go mobile solutions

Payments giant Mastercard has tied up with mobile commerce provider P97 Networks to give consumers a better experience in their gasoline station and convenience store purchases.

According to a company release, the global partnership promises to make refuelling and c-store shopping easier and faster with the help of mobile phones.

Mastercard will tap P97’s Petrozone, a cloud-based mobile platform for the convenience and retail fuel industry, to develop a solution that will enable fuel companies to come up with mobile apps, which can be used by consumers to search for the gas station of their choice, make mobile payments, and receive special store offers.

“We know that when a consumer pulls up to the pump, they are not thinking about making a payment. They just want to get what they need and go as fast as possible,” said Felix Marx, executive vice president of Mobile Transaction Solutions at MasterCard.

The mobile solution will also provide more secure mobile payments, added Donald Frieden, president and CEO of P97.

Innovations like this are becoming more and more important as businesses strive to differentiate their services and build customer loyalty, especially with the continuous increase in gasoline consumption.

Consumers pumped more than 135 billion gallons of gasoline last year in the United States, according to MasterCard SpendingPulse.