M Commerce from DoCoMo - more from the world leader...Japanese I-mode users will next week be able to download their monthly wireless Internet service bills to their handsets and pay them over the counter in convenience stores. NTT DoCoMo customers will have to pay for the privilege, however, while the Japanese giant couldn't say how much it expected to save from the initiative. The expanded billing system is being rebadged as a service and will be dubbed "combien?" Subscribers actually download an online bar code from a special site linked to DoCoMo's wireless portal. Once they have the bar code stored in their phone they can use it to pay for their monthly mobile phone bill at a convenience store. The code is only valid for one day. The two-dimensional bar code appears on the handset screen and the convenience store clerk scans it and charges the customer. "Combien?" will initially be available at two convenience stores in Tokyo starting Monday, DoCoMo said, and then will expand to some 1,400 stores nationwide by early July. While there is no fee for the actual "service," DoCoMo said subscribers must pay a "small" transmission charge to download the bar code. DoCoMo spokesperson Miki Nakajima McCants told Newsbytes the charge would depend on the amount of data downloaded, but estimated it would cost about 10-20 yen ($0.08 to $0.16) to get the bar code onto the screen. DoCoMo doesn't anticipate any problems with subscribers querying payment of download charges to receive an invoice from the phone company. "I don't think it will be a problem," she said. "The whole purpose of 'combien?' is to let customers have additional choice of making payments. Since it eliminates the need for a hard-copy invoice, customers can easily pay their bills whenever they visit a participating convenience store." She said about 20 percent of the company's customers still pay monthly charges by mailed invoice, while the rest pay online or set up a regular bank payment.