TNW Conference is teaming up with PayPal and Glownet to go cashless

Since TNW Conference’s inception, we’ve been using the trusted tokens found at festivals and events the world over: pay a cashier or machine some (a lot of) money, get handed some plastic tokens, spend some of aforementioned plastic tokens, come home to discover you still have €50 worth of (now useless) plastic tokens tucked away in your pocket.

It’s a convenient system for vendors: waiting times are slashed, payments are simplified, and you can make some residual profit on any tokens that don’t end up being spent. But it isn’t very fair for attendees, and it certainly isn’t very tech.

So this year we’ve decided to expand our longstanding partnership with PayPal, in order to spice up the payment process and make everyone’s lives easier. That’s right, TNW Conference is going completely cashless – but in order to still reap the efficiency benefits of the old token system, that doesn’t mean accepting card payments. Instead, we’re introducing RFID wristbands.

Intelligent Wristbands

We’ve teamed up with PayPal and Glownet to make this year’s conference wristbands a little bit more intelligent. Before you arrive, you’ll be able to add tokens to your wristband, in order to purchase food from our 25+ gourmet food truck vendors, and make the most of our bars and coffee stands. The wristbands will also be used for access control and to help you continue the conversation with startups and exhibitors after the event; simply by scanning your wristband to exchange contact information.

But perhaps most importantly, you won’t be going home with useless tokens in your pocket. If you opt to add tokens to your wrisrtbands using our convenient payments provider, PayPal, TNW will send you a refund for all unspent tokens purchased with PayPal after the event – straight to your PayPal account.

Refunds and instant top ups through PayPal

If you’re already a TNW Conference ticket holder, you can start adding tokens to your intelligent wristband from today – simply login to our order management portal. When you collect your wristband on day one, any tokens you’ve paid for in advance will be automatically loaded and ready to use at our awesome gourmet food trucks and bars across the festival terrain.

We’ve teamed up with PayPal to make this process as seamless as possible. Choosing them as your payments provider comes with the following perks:

1. One Touch: Simply enter your details once to be able to top up with a single click, whenever you need more tokens. Thanks to PayPal’s One Touch feature, your device will be enabled to securely make payments through your PayPal account.
2. Live Top up: If you’re running low on tokens during the conference, you’ll be able to add more straight from the TNW Conference app with a single click. While credit and debit cards are accepted at our physical kiosks across the conference terrain, PayPal is the only way to top up from your phone to your wristband during the event.
3. Automated Refunds: TNW will reimburse you for your unused tokens purchased with PayPal within 3 days on your PayPal account. No extra surcharge.

Learn more about our cashless payment wristbands on our website!