An approach is provided for purchasing items using contactless payment devices (credit cards and debit cards, key fobs, smartcards or other devices). The approach retrieves the contactless payment identifiers that each pertain to a separate payment account used by a user. One of the contactless payment identifiers is selected based on one or more selection criteria, such as user and monetary incentives. The approach further pays for purchases using the payment account that corresponds to the selected contactless payment identifier.