Spar is planning to offer its customers mobile payments from next year.

The group is among a number of retailers who will be able to accept Zapp payments, which stores will be able to offer through VeriFone terminals.

Other retailers which have signed up to the mobile payment innovation include Asda and Sainsbury’s.

Roy Ford, IT controller for Spar UK, said: “We will be working with VeriFone and WorldPay to enable Spar retailers to accept Zapp payments via our already installed VeriFone terminals.

“It is early days and we are looking at Q2 2015 before we see anything and that is providing all goes well with VeriFone who will be doing the integration work.”

According to the Centre for Economic and Business Research (Cebr), 20 million adults will use their mobiles to pay for goods and services by the end of the decade, with the value of purchases tripling from current levels to £14.2bn in 2018.

Peter Keenan, chief executive of Zapp, said: “At last the promise of a truly mobile and digital payment method will become a reality, meaning easier and more secure checkouts for millions.

“It’s amazing to have the support of such well known retailers. Together with our other partners this means millions of consumers will be able to shop at tens of thousands of merchants up and down the UK at launch.”

Zapp payments work through secure digital “tokens”, which mean customers don’t reveal any of their financial details (including bank account details) to retailers when they are shopping. This also means retailers do not need to store card details or incur the expense of PCI-DSS compliance.