The Catalyst Code

Ignorance could delay contactless-payments adoption according to a heading in Cardline, which quotes some wags who suggest that contactless isn’t going as fast as it might because of “the technology’s unfamiliarity among merchants and consumers.” (CardLine, subscription required).Of course it is hard to tell whether potential customers don’t choose something because they are ignorant or because they actually don’t see the value.

I’m afraid that the problem with contactless is that most merchants - and the ones that account for most of the dollar volume of sales - don’t seem to see the value in contactless at the point of sale. It costs money to install those terminals and things work pretty good at the checkout line now. Maybe consumers would see value if enough merchants took cards but therein lies the chicken and egg problem that has stymied so many who have tried to introduce their great “must have” innovations in the payments business.

Maybe contactless will ignite as a result of mobile or some other killer contactless app. But then again by the time mobile rolls around in the U.S. the current contactless technology that’s being pushed may not be the best solution. The experience with contactless—so little success after so much money and effort—is an object lesson to anyone who wants to ignite a catalyst reaction in the payments industry.