2015 is approaching its end - how did we do? Contactless Intelligence Weekly News Review

2015 is approaching its end - how did we do?

I am not sure how many of you, dear readers, will open and read this final editorial of the year, coming as it does in Christmas week. However, it would be wrong of me not to write a quick sum up of the highlights of 2015 as that would definitely be an intolerable loose end.

So, here we are, taking a brief a look back at the year that redefined the term ‘pay’ as a noun when proceeded by a brand name and showed us that, as long as we have a small micro payment card on our person, it is now acceptable to touch the contactless payment terminal with any part of the body. Oh, I can but imagine the numbers of would-be Jedi Knights who are going to be out in ‘force’ (the pun was intentional) waving their hands over a payment terminal and paying  - thanks to a bPay from Barclaycard secreted in their robe. Incidentally I once saw a video of a man dressed as Dumbledore get on a bus in London and pay by waving his wand over the terminal (the wand had a Oyster card chip in the end of it - but I digress…)

So, as well as the release of Apple Pay, bPay, Samsung Pay, Android Pay, Walmart Pay, and the announcement of Chase Pay for mobiles, we were also expected to accept ‘en masse’ the role of wearables as payment devices, too, thanks to the release of the Apple Watch. This challenge to the status quo was also taken up in 2015 by threatened ‘traditional’ watch companies looking to transform their watches into payment devices. One only has to look at the work that Swatch is doing to see that the industry is getting very serious on this topic.

We also saw a couple of giants stumble in 2015. A massive data breach at Gemalto came to light concerning their SIM cards and Softcard finally gave up the ghost and was taken over by Google - never to be heard of again. Something that did not give up the ghost in 2015 was the ten retailer alliance called Merchant Customer Exchange (MCX) and their payment solution, ‘CurrentC’. They railed against Apple Pay and continue to do so - albeit with more inclusive language - telling reporters the system is designed to integrate with other payment applications like Apple Pay – if the retailer decides to include them.

As well as the further development of contactless and mobile payment on public transport in, and around, London, one area that also saw great in-roads was that of charity collection. It’s an area with fantastic, innovative payment implementations from the likes of Save The Children and Cancer Research with their window payment innovation.

Looking ahead to 2016, we have a few topics that will be explored more fully. Card-On-File and In-App payment is going to be HUGE! (that’s my prediction, hence the capital letters). It’s already very big, but I am predicting that Card-On-File will be the mainstay of payment in the very near future - just look at certain Taxi apps and you will see what I mean. I am also predicting that Biometrics and payments will get even closer. A quote from the latest Gemalto blog reads, “Biometric technology will eliminate the need to carry a payment card, smartphone or a wearable by allowing users to authorise payments with a fingerprint, handprint, face or retina scan. It’s just a matter of time before we become the payment method, rather than our devices”.

We have been told that in 2016 London Taxis will take contactless payment as standard as well as the spread of such payment methods to street traders, stall holders and market vendors. We will be looking to cover these topics at the 2016 Contactless Intelligence Conference, along with some more future elements such as the ‘blockchain’, the reasons why bartering as a payment option may be making a comeback and the rise of ME2B (look it up - it could well be the future).

Finally, the news story that summed up payments in 2015 for me didn’t come from the trade journals or the national newspapers but from online satirical website, ‘The Daily Mash’, who put out an article claiming that “Retail staff have complained that contactless payment means they no longer get to stare intensely at customers while their card goes through”. The piece goes on to say;  ‘Nikki Hollis, who works in a garage, said, “The only good bit about this job was messing with people’s heads in that seemingly endless few seconds between PIN entry and PIN acceptance. They would look at me, I would look at them, they would look at the floor. Sometimes they would say something about the weather, which I would ignore. Then they start to shuffle uneasily, at that moment they want nothing more in the world than to take their Ginster’s product and flee into the night. About a third of the time I would pretend something was wrong with the machine, just to make them do it again. The rest of this job is shit, but for those few seconds I was a minor god.” A CBI spokesman said, “Soon your debit card will be a miniature drone which flies out of the window at night and makes aspirational purchases of Japanese denim and French horns. Look at your own payment history. Are you honestly saying we couldn’t spend it better?”’ 

This is the last Contactless Intelligence editorial of 2015. I'll be honest, some weeks the editorial writes itself, some weeks it's pure blood, sweat and tears (not mine). However, I hope you feel that we have touched upon some salient points in the industry and at the very least have acted as a spring board to your week. 

The next Newsfeed will be on Monday the 11th January 2016. So, until then, all that remains for me to do is to wish all our partners, contributors and, of course, our readers a very Merry Christmas and a Happy and Prosperous New Year! 

Until next year.

Steve Atkins
Contactless Intelligence