UK coffee chain Costa links up with O2 to offer free WiFi in time for Olympics

In a move that is sure to increase the number of laptops you can expect to see in your local cafe, O2 has announced an agreement to provide Costa, the UK coffee shop chain, with free WiFi.

The deployment has started in London to set up the service ahead of this summer’s Olympics and Queen’s Jubilee celebrations.

O2’s wifi service is free for anyone, no matter which mobile or broadband provider they are with. It’s a sign up service where users need to register and then can use the signal in any Costa shop or any of O2’s WiFi hotspots.

Benefits with loyalty

There are benefits for people who sign up to Costa’s loyalty scheme of course. Regular customers are capped at 30 minutes of free WiFi per day, per registered device, and Coffee Club members get unlimited access. Both methods are free, it just depends on how long you plan to take over your coffee and wifi as to whether you want to sign up.

This is the latest in a series of new partnerships with industry and sector leading brands for O2 WiFi. In 2012, O2 Wifi has already announced an additional 3,000 UK hotspots which are currently being deployed across the UK.

For O2, this represents a further step towards becoming a key partner to the retail industry. Last week O2 announced the launch of O2 Wallet which allows shopping and offers to be managed together and is increasing it’s free WiFi access by partnering with McDonalds.