These days, if you can’t use your phone to do something, it’s almost like, why do it at all? You should at least be able to buy a microwaveable burrito, if not a flat screen TV, with a magic wave of your smartphone. Big retailers like 7-Eleven, Walmart and Target are teaming up to  create a new mobile payment network so you can buy almost anything your heart desires.

This new system will go by the name Merchant Customer Exchange, or MCX, and is said to work somewhat like services Google uses already on its Android devices, reports Reuters.

The MCX will allow retailers from restaurants to gas stations to push their personalized promotions via the payment system which will apparently be available on almost any type of smartphone.

Starbucks also recently threw its hat into the ring in a partnership with Square to launch its mobile payment system and process all the payments beaming from customers’ phones to Starbucks for anything from lattes to mugs to whichever smooth-sounding pop is currently being sold at the register.

There are a whole host of retailers involved in the new MCX in addition to those already mentioned, including Best Buy, CVS, Darden Restaurants, Hy-Vee, Lowe’s, Publix, Sears, Shell, Sunoco and HMSHost.

Now as soon as fingerprint/retina scans are available for ID purposes, actual wallets with paper money and credit cards could become simply outdated. Sort of like tiny Trapper Keepers.

Big retailers team up on mobile payments plan [Reuters]

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