Embodiments of a method and system are disclosed. One embodiment is a method for controlling operations in a mobile communication device that is enabled for near field communication (NFC). The method involves starting an NFC service in the mobile communication device, starting an initialization process of a secure element (SE), e.g., a Universal Integrated Circuit Card (UICC), of the mobile communication device in response to starting the NFC service, and once the initialization process of the SE has begun, monitoring an SE-specific session ID for an indication of the status of the initialization process of the SE. If the SE-specific session ID indicates that the initialization process is not complete, the method involves continuing to monitor the SE-generated session ID and if the SE-specific session ID indicates that the initialization process is complete, the method involves notifying the NFC service that the initialization process of the SE is complete.