CommBank Notes Rise in Local Mobile Payments Use

Australia is proving to be fertile ground for mobile payments, as revealed by a recent study from Commonwealth Bank. As it turns out, customers are increasingly calling for mobile payment services, so much so that, in just the six months between January and June 2018, mobile payments use was up over 35 percent.

The raw numbers saw 16.8 million transactions in that six months for tap and pay service users, and that’s good news for Visa cardholders, because Commonwealth Bank is releasing a new feature to its mobile payment user market. Specifically, it’s contactless payments through the Tap & Pay functionality in the bank’s app.

Plus, Visa cardholders with Commonwealth Bank will also get access to both Google Pay and Samsung Pay, and for those with Fitbit and Garmin smartwatches, mobile payments service will also be available herein.

This turns out to be a hefty windfall for major supermarkets, where around 20 percent of all tap and pay transactions take place. Major fast food chains produce 10 percent, and gas stations / other major retailers kick in another five percent.

Commonwealth Bank’s acting executive manager for everyday banking, Michael Baumann, noted “…By extending the suite of CBA supported digital wallets to our Visa cardholders, we’re providing our customers with even more options to make a payment at the point of sale, whether that be through the CommBank app or their smartwatch. We’re seeing customers who are stretched for time taking advantage of the ease and convenience of digital payments. Our data has revealed that groceries, food and beverages and petrol are the most commonly purchased goods.”

The good news in all this is that, clearly, mobile payments is catching on worldwide and in a big way. We’ve just seen Hong Kong start to take mobile payments seriously—despite some issues of security—and Visa is figuring that the US is ready for contactless card payments as well. After several years, we’re seeing mobile payments become a mainstream, fairly normal practice, and that’s good news by most any standard.

There will still be some problems along the way—the more users, the more problems are discovered that may never have been seen before—but the end result remains the same. We’ll see plenty more mobile payments before it’s all said and done.