ATLANTA - Verizon Wireless, T-Mobile USA and AT&T Inc. are planning a revolution, one that would replace credit and debit cards with smartphone contactless payment, Bloomberg News reports.

Discover Financial Services and Barclays Plc may partner with the mobile carriers on a test at Atlanta and three other cities in the United States. The test ?" the largest effort to date relating to mobile payments ?" involves consumers purchasing merchandise by waving a smartphone in front of a contactless payment device.

"This is definitely a game-changer," said industry consultant Richard Crone of Crone Consulting LLC. The mobile carriers "are the biggest recurring billers in every market. They are experts at processing payments."

The mobile service is comparable to ones already used in the United Kingdom, Turkey and Japan. Payments would go through Discover??s network and Barclays would help manage the accounts.

"What is a cell phone, except a mechanism for consumers to address their lives in whatever way they choose?" said Gary Townsend, CEO of Hill-Townsend Capital LLC. "There??s certainly no reason if an AT&T account can effectively be carried on a phone that a JPMorgan or a Wells Fargo card can??t be there, too. In fact, the antitrust issues would demand that that be allowed."

Merchants could be the tipping factor in adoption of contactless payment given the high transaction fees paid to MasterCard and Visa. While debit card swipe fees will be capped after Congress passed the Durbin Amendment, the Justice Department is considering bringing a civil lawsuit against Visa for not letting retailers add a surcharge to customers paying with credit cards.

"We have long argued that real competition is missing from today??s payments market," said Brian Dodge, a spokesman for the Retail Industry Leaders Association. "The emergence of a secure and reliable competing network that serves the demand from consumers for mobility payment options and reduces retailers?? costs would be welcomed news."