Barclays offers free Wi-Fi in store with BT partnership

Barclays has announced that customers will be able to use a free Wi-Fi service in its 1,500 branches across the UK.

The bank, which is often at the frontline of more innovative technology offerings such as its Pingit application, has partnered with BT to provide the service which is already rolled out in 800 stores with the rest set to come online by April.

It has been trialled in three branches and will be offered under a "BarclaysFreeWifi" network in store.

The chief executive of Barclays Retail and Business Banking, Ashok Vaswani, said the move would help customers stay online while in store and also show off its mobile offerings to customers.

"We are always keen to show our customers how easy our mobile apps are to use, so we are now rolling out free Wi-fi across our Barclays branches, and our front line staff say this will help them give product demos using our customers own mobiles and tablets," he said.

"We hope by providing this free service our customers will be able to instantly download and use all our mobile apps, and we are on hand to show them how."

The rollout is the latest in a long line of free Wi-Fi offerings that now exist, in locations such as the London Underground, key areas around London provided by O2, and businesses such as pubs and shops.