The staid old world of Golf is an unlikely place to pioneer new tech, but ‘Golf’s original championship’, The Open, will be accepting mobile payments for the first time this summer.
As patrons of the championship and for the first time at any Open, Mastercard will enable spectators to order and pay for their food and drinks through the Qkr! with Masterpass app whilst on the course.
The 146th Open will take place at Royal Birkdale, near Liverpool, and the famous Links course is expecting more than 200,000 spectators between July 16th and 23rd.
Spectators will be able to use the Qkr app to order and pay for food and drink from their seats on the large grandstand on the 9th hole. Their order will be delivered to them at their seats within minutes, so they don’t need to miss a second of the action.
Qkr is powered by the Masterpass digital payment service, which allows consumers to securely store any kind of payment cards – not just Mastercard – as well as select their payment preferences. With Qkr, golf fans will be able to make secure, one-touch purchases without having to enter card details each and every time and avoid making unnecessary trips to cash machines.
Mark O’Meara, Open Champion and Mastercard ambassador said: “There’s no doubt that during my time in the game, innovation in golf has taken the sport to a higher standard and the competition more intense. For fans the excitement and entertainment is what it’s all about, so I’m all for innovation like Mastercard’s Qkr, why queue up and miss some of the action, when you can order refreshments from your phone and have them delivered straight to you.”
Johnnie Cole-Hamilton, Executive Director – Championships at The R&A said, “The Open is one of the world’s great sporting events and we want to make sure our fans enjoy a truly outstanding experience at the Championship. This new innovation from Mastercard will speed up the payment process and add a new dimension to the service we can offer them. Being able to order ahead and make a mobile payment means fans can relax when ordering refreshments and enjoy seeing the world’s best golfers in action.”
Mark Barnett, President, Mastercard UK & Ireland said: “We are continually exploring ways to introduce Mastercard’s technology to our partnerships to provide our cardholders with a better experience. Whether at a sporting event like The Open, or a gig or in a restaurant or bar, the emphasis has to be on having fun and being immersed in the event. For us that means minimising the time spent on payments or queues so that they don’t get in the way.”
In addition to The Open, Qkr has been successfully used at other large sporting events such as Copa America and The Arnold Palmer Invitational.
Qkr is available in 10 markets across the world and is being used in a variety of settings such as paying and splitting bills at restaurants; paying for petrol and parking; in-seat ordering at stadiums and cinemas; authorising mobile payments at vending machines and paying for school meals. It is being used differently in different markets to remove friction in commerce and enhance consumer experience. The app makes paying with your mobile simple, convenient and secure.
In the UK, Qkr is already being used at wagamama, ASK Italian, Young’s Pubs, Zizzi, Carluccio’s, Byron and Change Please, a mobile coffee-delivery social project run by the homeless in London. TGI Fridays is also using Qkr’s “Bar Tab” feature to enable customers to open a tab at the bar and close their bill at the end of the evening from their mobiles, without needing to leave a card behind the bar