Visa Europe processed 3 billion contactless transactions in 12 months
(11 May 2016 – Europe) Visa Europe has announced that it processed three billion contactless transactions in the last 12 months – a threefold increase on the the same period in the previous year.
Contactless payments now accounts for one in every five Visa in-person transactions in Europe, up from one in 60 3 years ago.
Visa Europe said that in the UK, contactless adoption grew threefold to 153 million transactions in April 2016 from 51m in the same period the year before. Britain was joined by Poland and Spain as the most popular locations where the payment method has been adopted.
Tristan Kirchner, Executive Director, Product Management at Visa Europe said: “The last 12 months has seen contactless payments continue its extraordinary growth as this quick and convenient form of payment reaches more consumers and merchants throughout Europe”
“This kind of success hasn’t happened overnight, and it’s down to the sterling efforts across many teams at Visa and the wider payment industry making today’s achievement possible while setting the stage for tomorrow’s technology, including new wearable devices and mobile payment services,” she said.
Figures from industry body the UK Cards Association show there are 84.2 million contactless cards in the UK as of February this year.
Last year, consumers spent £7.75 billion on contactless cards, compared with £2.32 billion in 2014.
“With contactless cards, rather than cash, becoming the preferred way to pay for smaller purchases, there has been a dramatic drop in the average value of a card transaction in recent years,” said Richard Koch, head of policy at the UK Cards Association.
“Contactless cards are also being used to pay for travel and to donate to charity and as technology evolves, there will be even more environments in which to use contactless.”
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