Brits still not that into contactless payments

UK consumers continue to be largely unwowed by the idea of ditching cash and using contactless technologies instead, such as mobile wallet phones and wave and pay cards.

More than a third (35 per cent) of Brits polled in a new survey said they would not use mobile wallet tech, compared to just nine per cent who said they would definitely use it.

Contactless pre-payment cards were slightly more popular with consumers: 16 per cent said they would use them, compared to 19 per cent who would not. And while contactless debit and credit cards had the same percentage of future users (16 per cent), they attracted a lot more refuseniks (31 per cent).

However for all the contactless payment options a significant proportion of respondents appear open to persuasion - around a third said they would consider using each tech.

Of those who would use m-wallets the largest proportion (84 per cent) said the reason would be convenience, followed by 57 per cent who hope to reduce queuing time. Just four per cent of survey respondents claim to have used a mobile wallet to make a payment, compared to eight per cent of consumers who said they had made a payment using a contactless credit or debit card.

The survey which was commissioned by payments company Ingenico was based on the responses of 1,000 consumers in England, Scotland and Wales.

An O2 trial last year of mobile contactless tech for travel and small value payments on the London Underground found consumers were more keen on the travel feature than the payments side, with 89 per cent of testers saying they are interested in taking up a mobile Oyster app, compared to 68 per cent who were keen on adopting contactless payments.