Covid-19 is impacting the behaviour of Irish consumers, as they shift towards using contactless to pay for goods and service, according to figures released today by AIB. The data has been compiled from over one million debit card transactions between 1st and 12th April, and has been anonymised and aggregated.
The data reveals that Irish consumers are spending 30% more per transaction using contactless on their debit cards since the limit was increased on April 1st. Consumers are also spending more using digital wallets with average spending among Apple Pay and Google Pay users up 41% and 45% respectively as they look to avoid unnecessary interactions in stores.
When broken down demographically, the data also reveals that since April 1st;
Meanwhile, of those in other age groups contactless now accounts for:
Fergal Coburn, Chief Digital & Innovation Officer at AIB, spoke on the figures.
“As seen from our insights, Covid-19 has rapidly changed the behaviour of Irish consumers and how they spend their money. The data shows a shift across all demographics towards spending more using contactless payments since the spending limit was increased to €50 at the start of April", he said.
"What is even more interesting is the shift towards Apple Pay and Google Pay, which have a higher limit than contactless on cards, which points to consumers looking to further avoid unnecessary interactions with chip and pin terminals and pay for more of their goods and services using contactless.”