Your choice when shopping in-store: wait in the checkout line or pay via mobile app to breeze out the door? As the following article from The Paypers reports, UK shoppers would rather stand in the queue.
New research conducted by Paysafe has revealed that 52% of UK consumers are weary of checkout free stores due to data privacy fears.
Although frictionless and invisible payments have been hailed as great methods of improving the payments experience, retailers still have to convince consumers that these payments options are safe regarding data and security.
According to the research, ‘invisible’ payments are not trusted by 52% of UK consumers, who cite fraud as the biggest concern they have for using them.
About 69% worry that they will be overcharged if they used this type of service and 59% report that checkout-free stores – where smart technologies record the shopping basket and automate payments – sound too risky, or they’d need to know more before using them.
But this is against a landscape of all-round data insecurity among UK shoppers, with 43% expressing concerns around the use of their data. Meanwhile, other emerging payment methods are polarising consumer opinion – 39% of the UK public would let fridges automatically re-order food, but 43% don’t expect to adopt the technology in the next two to three years.
The report, called Lost in Transaction: Payment Trends 2018, is an international research study investigating consumer attitudes to new and traditional payment methods. The research incorporates consumer views from the UK, US, Canada, Germany and Austria, and draws comparisons with Paysafe’s inaugural Lost in Transaction report in 2017.
The survey results are puzzling given that it seems reasonable to assume shoppers do not like to wait in line, plus the UK is further along in trying to encourage non-cash payments. Additionally, privacy and security concerns do not go away using payment cards, and incorrectly priced items happen even with human checkout. So maybe this survey is an anomaly. Sounds like the merchants, and card issuers and networks, have not done an effective job in educating consumers on the advantages of mobile self-checkout.
Overview by Raymond Pucci, Associate Director, Research Services at Mercator Advisory Group
