BERLIN, June 26 (Xinhua) -- Google has rolled out its "Google Pay" smartphone payment services to customers in Germany, the U.S. technology company announced on Tuesday.

Germans are now able to use the Google Pay application to make payments with their smartphones in stores which support contactless cashier terminals.

The service will initially be limited to holders of Mastercard or Visa credit cards, as well as individuals who have accounts with the online banking providers Commerzbank ("Comdirect"), N26 and Boon.

Speaking to reporters on Tuesday, Google Germany manager Philipp Justus described Google Play as an "open platform" which would grow organically as contactless payments become more widespread.

Justus added that his company was consequently "looking forward to further partnerships", including additional joint ventures with the financial institutes.

Germany is the 19th country in which Google Pay is available to smartphone owners with the operating system Android that was developed by Google. Rival Apple has yet to introduce its own "Apple Pay" services in the Germany.

Although many retail outlets in Germany have overhauled their cashier terminals in recent years to enable near field communication (NFC), German customers have been slow to embrace the cash-free technology. According to numbers by the German federal bank, only 12 out of 21,000 transactions are conducted via mobile devices.

Speaking to Xinhua, Google Germany representative Lena Heuermann is confident that "our open ecosystem will start successfully and grow steadily".

"The majority of our users have already submitted payment data to us, which testifies to their trust in us and our security precautions," Heuermann added.

Google emphasized that, unlike Apple Pay in other countries, it would not charge a transaction fee for the use of Google Pay in Germany. Instead, the company saw the introduction of the payment service as a means to incentivize the use of its smartphone operating system Android.