The two companies have developed the solution, called SmartPay, to allow Canadian taxi companies to accept real-time payments using Interac®, Canada's national debit card service.

The solution uses a taxi's existing radio system to securely transmit wireless data to authorise card payments. Until now, Canada's only in-vehicle wireless point-of-sale solutions were based on cellular networks and required the merchant to pay airtime connection fees. Taxis could also accept manual credit card payments.

Keycorp worked with Digital Dispatch Systems to integrate the Keycorp K23 payment terminals into the taxi radio dispatch terminal.

Digital Dispatch Systems chose Keycorp K23 terminals because of their large backlit graphics display, faster processing speed, superior memory and the capability to add new applications in the future. The K23 terminals also have enhanced security features as well as an award-winning ergonomic PIN Pad design.

"SmartPay can help taxi companies across Canada to gain market share" said Rob Milne, Vice President of Marketing for Digital Dispatch. "Not only can our customers provide better service, but debit card transaction fees are typically much lower than credit card fees, so they also save money."

BlueBird Cabs Ltd, based in Canada, has already signed a contract with Digital Dispatch Systems to purchase the SmartPay system for its fleet of taxi cabs.
Jag Dhaliwal, on behalf of the Board of Directors of BlueBird, said: "With the SmartPay system, our customers have the option of using either credit cards or debit cards to pay for their ride. We are thrilled to be the first cab company to bring this to our customers."

Paul DeRosse, Managing Director Keycorp Canada Inc., said: "Canadians have been pushing taxi companies to introduce mobile debit payments for some time and Keycorp is proud to be partnering with Digital Dispatch to make this a reality."