The UK Cards Association (a leading industry trade body) has announced that new figures released today show that in January 2015, UK consumers spend twice as much on average via the internet versus in-store and this has led to 30% of all spending on cards coming from e-commerce transactions.
According to the Association, £15.4 ($22.9) billion of the total £46.5 ($69.1) billion spent on cards in January were internet based transactions and the average transaction greatly exceeded that of in-store with the average internet based transaction reaching £96.10 ($142.8) versus £46.53 ($69.1) for in-store payments.
Commenting on the results, Richard Koch, Head of Policy at The UK Cards Association said, “These figures demonstrate the extent to which online shopping has become a way of life, with almost a third of all card spending now happening on the internet. Interestingly, while people still make transactions more regularly in shops, when they do shop on the internet, they tend to spend far more – demonstrating that consumers’ bigger transactions happen online.”
With e-commerce expected to continue to grow by double digits in the near future, one can expect the share of e-commerce payments to increasingly come from cards. However with a number of popular e-commerce payment alternatives like PayPal, Klarna and others that do not rely on cards in the UK and Europe, the overall share of card payments in e-commerce will never reach close to 100%.
Overview by Tristan Hugo-Webb, Associate Director, Global Payments for Mercator Advisory Group
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