More Asians embracing contactless payments

MasterCard revealed that consumers across Asia and the Pacific, which includes the Philippines, are embracing contactless payments.

The number of unique contactless users, also known as tappers, grew by a hefty 49 percent in 2014 compared to the previous year.

Australia led the pack with nearly twothirds of all MasterCard in-store transactions being contactless. MasterCard Australia also experienced a 45-percent growth for unique tappers last year.

Behind Australia was Singapore which saw contactless payments growing more than two-fold to post its all-time high. The significant growth was driven by higher number of Mastercard contactless users in the country.

As of December last year, one-third of supermarket transactions in Singapore were contactless.

Hong Kong has also seen the benefit of a strong marketing push with the growth of contactless transactions more than quadrupling in 2014.

New Zealanders are also increasingly using contactless technology.

According to MasterCard research, eight out of 10 users said this payment technology saves time (62 percent) and is convenient and easy to use (58 percent).

In the Philippines, McDonald’s introduced contactless card payments with MasterCard PayPass, enabling consumer payment convenience in McDonald’s locations.

MasterCard’s Group head of Emerging Payments in Asia/Pacific Raj Dhamodharan said the rapid growth in contactless and mobile payments is expected to continue with so much cash that needs to be displaced in the region.

Predominantly cash-based in the past, developing markets shifted to new payment technologies, with mobile point of sale (mPOS) being one of the key drivers across Asia/Pacific in 2014.

mPOS technology enables merchants to convert their smartphone or tablets into a terminal to accept payment cards.

According to research by the Annapolis Consulting Group, the use of mPOS worldwide is estimated to grow from eight million in 2013 to 18 million by 2017. This will be led, in part, by the recent rollouts of MasterCard’s mPOS technology in Asia/Pacific.