Back to Press Releases Telefónica Germany
28.11.2012

Music, e-books and films billed to your mobile:buying made easy for O2 customers with Google Play

A speaker icon, representing the "Read page aloud" feature
MUNICH. O2 customers can now also pay for music, e-books and films with their mobile phone bill. Telefónica Deutschland is the first operator in Germany who offers its customers such a service. Purchases are secure, convenient, require only a few steps and are settled by means of a mobile phone bill or prepaid credit.
More and more smartphone users are conveniently buying digital goods with their mobile phones. Telefónica Deutschland is expanding the shopping options in Google Play. Now O2 customers can also pay for music, e-books and films with their mobile phone bill. They can choose content from the world's largest online library and from thousands of music tracks. "Mobile payment is a key part of our ecosystem of financial products and services," says Michiel van Eldik, Managing Director Wholesale & Partner Management at Telefónica in Germany. "Our mobile bill payment service is already used by 500,000 customers a month."

Complete flexibility in the cloud

The purchased music tracks are stored in the cloud for playback from any number of end devices. The tracks can also be played offline by Android users with a special app. What makes the service really convenient is that Google Play customers can synchronise up to 20,000 tracks in their personal libraries free-of-charge and play them back anywhere. There is no upper limit for Google Play tracks. O2 customers can get the most out of films, too, and choose from an extensive collection. The customer buys a one-month licence for each film. After starting the film, it is available to play for 48 hours. During this time it can be paused and restarted any number of times. Films are also conveniently streamed from the cloud, meaning that customers don't have to save them to an end device to which they are then limited. Instead, they can watch their choice of film on a smartphone, tablet or computer, entirely as they wish. O2 customers can also choose from e-books. One very practical feature is the digital bookmark. Highlights and bookmarks are continually synchronised in the background so that when the e-book is closed, the position is remembered for the next reading session.

Three steps to a track, film or book

Once they have chosen their music, film or e-book in the store, customers choose the "Charge O2 account" payment option and then click "Accept & buy". After this, the music or e-book is ready for downloading and using, and films can be played. If the customer does not like the e-book he bought, it can be returned within seven days after the order and the price is automatically refunded.
Telefónica Deutschland Holding AG, listed at the Frankfurt Stock Exchange in the Prime Standard, and its wholly-owned, operationally active subsidiary Telefónica Germany GmbH & Co. OHG belong to Telefónica Europe and are part of the Spanish telecommunication group Telefónica S.A. The company offers its German private and business customers post-paid and prepaid mobile telecom products as well as innovative mobile data services based on the GPRS, UMTS and LTE technologies with its product brand O2. In addition, the integrated communications provider also offers DSL fixed network telephony and high-speed internet. Telefónica Europe has more than 105 million mobile and fixed network customers in Spain, Great Britain, Ireland, the Czech Republic, Slovakia and Germany.