Worldpay has been consulting its crystal ball and has decided that credit and debit cards have had their day and that the UK is the next big thing in ecommerce.
Worldpay, a payment-processing company that of course has absolutely no vested interest in the decline of cards, reckons the UK will be the world’s third-biggest ecommerce market by 2021.
That’s surely because we’re not very good at sport or weather, and spend all our time clicking on online products from the couch in our onesies, armed only with a large Prosecco, as the rain batters the living-room windows.
There’s no mention of those specifics in Worldpay’s annual Global Payments Report. However, it does suggest that the UK ecommerce market will be worth £203bn (US$268bn) by 2021, behind only China and the USA.
Worldpay looked at the online shopping market in 36 countries and five continents and decided that debit cards are on their way out. They’re predicted to fall from 31% of the total ecommerce market to 26%, with credit cards and cash also going the way of the dodo.
Remarkably, the ewallet company has decided that ewallets are set for robust growth. By 2021, says Worldpay (an ewallet provider), they’ll become the most popular method for online payment, with 34% of the market. This should see the UK mcommerce market rocket by 21% a year in the next five years.
Chief Product Officer, Global eCom at Worldpay Dave Glaser, said: “The UK is a highly developed ecommerce market, with a population of over 66m – 95% of whom have access to the Internet.
“As a result, consumers are comfortable with making a wide variety of purchases online and via multiple devices and payment methods. The predicted rise in both ecommerce and mcommerce is a strong vote of confidence in the security and convenience of the UK’s digital-payments infrastructure.
“UK consumers are among the world’s earliest adopters of modern technologies, including new payment methods, so retailers need to stay on top of technological and regulatory developments. For example, mobile’s share of ecommerce is set to increase to nearly 50% in the next five years, while smartphones will outpace tablets in the same timeframe.
He adds that merchants should invest in developing their own apps for a seamless shopping and checkout experience across every device, and support the most popular payment methods.
These include Worldpay, an ewallet provider offering a secure place to hold one or more currency purses.
