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Visa Europe is apparently preparing to launch one or more trials with new iPhone attachments, which would enable consumers to tap their iPhones to pay with Visa payWave.

Update: A new iPhone app is available for download on iTunes from Visa Europe supporting the iCarte attachment from Canada-based Wireless Dynamics. The card scheme plans to demonstrate the app with this attachment and probably also will demo a separate app and attachment from U.S.-based DeviceFidelity at this week's Cartes exhibition in Paris. End update.

One of the recently posted iPhone apps, "Visa Mobile for iCarte," requires users to have the iCarte attachment from Canada-based Wireless Dynamics, which also developed the app. The O2 UK operator designation is visible on sample screenshots on the app page in iTunes. Another sample screenshot shows a pie chart for what appears to be the percentage of used and unused value for a Visa prepaid card. Two of the screens repeat Visa Europe's slogan: "Life flows better with Visa."

Update: There is also a new iPhone app for Visa Europe called iCaisse, developed by U.S.-based DeviceFidelity, which supplies an iPhone case with a slot for the vendor's microSD card that carries payWave. DeviceFidelity had provided another app to U.S.-based Visa Inc. for trials going on now in the United States with major U.S. banks. The app for Visa Europe contains features required by European banks, some of which will want to also support high-value payments with PIN entry and offline reset of transaction counters with the payWave application on the iPhone. End update.

As NFC Times reported in June, Visa was planning to endorse the iCarte, following its earlier endorsement of contactless microSD cards and a contactless case for the iPhone from DeviceFidelity. In October, NFC Times reported that Visa Europe was planning to launch trials of mobile payment over the following few months using NFC bridge technologies–with a "view to commercializing" some of the devices. One of those devices would be the iCarte, along with the DeviceFidelity microSD cards.

It’s unclear when Visa Inc., which shares a brand and intellectual property with its bank-owned affiliate Visa Europe, might trial iCarte. Visa Europe is said to be taking the lead in using the device. Visa Inc. is involved in the U.S. trials with at least four major banks, using the contactless microSD product, In2Pay, from DeviceFidelity. The cards can be used in other phones, but for the iPhone, which does not have a microSD-card slot, the vendor has developed the special case, which sports not only a microSD slot but a full-size contactless antenna.

Visa Europe has already announced it will trial DeviceFidelity's product with Akbank in Turkey. There probably will be others announced this week. At Cartes, the card scheme is expected to demonstrate over-the-air downloads of the payWave application and tapping the phone to pay. Visa Europe is expected to trial both iCarte and In2Pay in card-emulation mode, though iCarte contains an NFC chip, which would enable it to also read tags, embedded, for example, in smart posters to trigger e-coupon downloads. The device would also work in peer-to-peer mode. The secure chip, like the NFC chip, is supplied by NXP Semiconductors, so the device also could support a Mifare application, popular in transit ticketing.

Wireless Dynamics recently introduced an iCarte version for the iPhone 4. It had provided one for the previous two iPhone models. The company announced the iCarte around the time of the Cartes 2009 show. But the device has been delayed as the technology company waited for certification from Apple and also from Visa. It's not clear yet if the device has full certification from the card network or only a waiver for trials.