“Since we still have the scanners, we thought it would be silly to shut them down during the negotiations. I hope that we can come to an agreement within the coming weeks,” says Kim Frølund, IT responsible at Spisestuerne and adds that it is only existing Fingopay-users that can use the scanners. It is not a possibility to sign up, as long as the negotiations are taking place.

During the spring and summer, more than 880 users signed up to have their Dankort connected to the vein pattern of one of their fingers, as a way to pay for their lunch, croissants, or afternoon snacks at Spisestuerne’s canteen at Solbjerg Plads.

Between mid-April and August, the users made more than 6,000 transactions at the cantina, making up 10 percent of all Dankort payments, according to Nick Dryden, CEO at Stahler Limited, which runs Fingopay.

“Even during the exam and summer period the usage of Fingopay just climbed. Usually, when you introduce new payment methods, you have high usage in the beginning, and then it tails out. This hasn’t been the case with Fingopay,” he says and is very satisfied about the outcome of the project, which has now come to an end, as the pilot project was set to end after the summer break.

Kim Frølund, IT responsible at Spisestuerne, has been excited about the project from day one.

“I have been heavily involved in the project, as new technologies excite me. It has been great fun to try it out and show the customers a new way of paying, and we have learned so much about incorporation of new technologies in our self-service environment,” he says.

A unique project

Fingopay has run several projects in the UK, but the pilot project at Spisestuerne was unique. For the first time ever, the new payment solution was installed in a self-service environment, and this has provided valuable insights for Fingopay, says Nick Dryden.

“We can always learn. But what we specifically have learned is how we can make the registration process easier in the future. And that’s been great, really,” he says and points out that the Danes are really good at adopting new technologies, which is why Fingopay wants to concentrate their efforts on introducing the new payment solution at other shops in Copenhagen.The same goes for the cities Manchester, UK, and Atlanta, USA, which have been selected as Fingopay cities

Esben Torpe Jørgensen, Director of Development and Governance at Nets, is also very satisfied with the outcome of the pilot project.

“It has been super exciting to see the new payment method at work. The environment at CBS has been an ideal place to test it, as you have customers coming here again and again, and that makes it easier to observe the development of the usage,” he says.

Esben Torpe Jørgensen points out, just like Nick Dryden, that the sign up-process needs to be improved before Fingopay can be reintroduced in some other shopping-environment – which it will, he promises.

“There is no doubt about the fact that the solution itself works, but the sign up-process needs to be redesigned. It’s a bit too complex as it is now, but we want to spread the Fingopay-solution for sure,” he says.

Campus