Every year since 2011, when Google first introduced a digital wallet, has been proclaimed as the Year of the Digital Wallet. The “new”, innovative and convenient way to store your credit cards…well, money.
Apparently, Google was a bit ahead of the curve, not to anyone’s surprise. The failure for Google to penetrate the market has a wide variety of explanations but today, not much has really changed for the Digital Wallet space.
Digital wallet adoption continues to be popular in a small niche of the population in developed markets. However, overall, the percentage of consumers planning to use digital wallets has remained stagnant since Apple Pay’s launch, growing from 24% in December 2014 to just 26% in September 2017.
So, why a slow uptake and usage for digital wallets? According to Michael Hsu, vice-president with Ipsos market research, the common concern for using your smartphone’s digital wallet to make payments or transfer money is security.
He continues to suggest that only 7 percent of a survey group said they had made a mobile payment using NFC in 2017, from 5 percent the year before despite that fact that Canadians are willing to adopt new types of mobile payments in the future.
Digital Wallets vs Peer-to-Peer Payments
Consumers are increasingly looking to peer-to-peer payment apps to transfer money among a group of friends instead of paper (i.e. cash or cheque). According to a VoCUL Representative Consumer Survey, 16% of respondents aged 18-24 are using P2P apps at least weekly, and 23% of respondents aged 25-34 are doing the same.
PayUp Jack is not a digital wallet. It is a money transfer tool designed to help the Social Organizer in a group of friends to collect money seamlessly, instantly and securely. PayUp Jack, supported by VISA, adheres to the highest standard of security protocol defined by VISA and Peoples Payments Solution. In fact, PayUp Jack is a web-based app (no need to download anything) which adds a layer of security when it comes to transferring money between friends.
So, is 2019 the year of the digital wallet? I don’t think so. With the payments landscape and money transfer tools growing every day, the digital wallet will just become another method of payment or money transfer.
