Samsung Pay transport card service launches in South Korea

If, like me, you spend a fair amount of time zipping around on public transport, then you might be interested to hear that Samsung Pay has just launched its dedicated transport payment service in South Korea.

The Samsung Pay Transportation Card Service brings both Korea’s T-Money and Cashbee pre-registered cards into a single service, which allows commuters to pay for bus travel, underground access and taxis using their mobile phone.

“Samsung Pay’s Transportation Card Service provides our customers with a much more convenient and diverse mobile payment experience. We plan to extend our partnerships so that we can move even closer to a world where we can easily and safely make payments without having to carry around a wallet.” – Samsung

Furthermore, the transport cards can be topped up with credit or debit cards that are also registered with Samsung Pay, keeping everything under one single convenient system. T-Money cards can be recharged with both Samsung and KB Kookmin cards, while mobile Cashbee transportation cards can be recharged with Lotte cards. Samsung is looking to partner up with additional credit card companies in the future.

We don’t have any official word about expansion plans yet, but hopefully Samsung will be looking to roll out a similar transport payment system to other countries and cities too. China, Spain and the UK are set to receive Samsung Pay in 2016, and I could certainly see myself using a smartphone to tap in and out of the London Underground.