Payments and fraud are the theme for the final installment of our New Year series looking at the future of retail in 2014. It’s a year in which, as we’ve seen in previous features, mobile is set to be on the rise, linking the store and digital commerce, and multichannel will be ever-more important. So what does that mean for payments? Our experts tell us.
Ecommerce fusion
“We’re seeing fusion of ecommerce with bricks and mortar. It’s no longer a question of going into the shop or shopping online, but about bringing those two environments together. For the merchant it makes a lot of sense to bring together bricks and mortar payments and ecommerce so shoppers can use their cards at any point of interaction and the merchant has their details from whatever points they’ve been used. It’s about securing data across multiple points and interactions.
“As a consumer it means that if I go onto a site and buy a dress, I can make the conscious decision not to have it delivered to home but to go to store and try on, click and collect. Because payments are held in one central point, the retailer sees me as a consumer right across the board. They don’t have to go to multiple systems, but have the security of holding that data. It’s about bringing together the virtual and physical world.
“Taking what is a traditional point of sale in store and putting it on tablet technology means I can go into store, browse on tablet, pull up website of the merchant in store and make payment either using mobile, chip and pin or making payment on the web. It’s about extending the channel, blurring the line between the two. That’s something we are seeing more and more.”
Wendy Dobson, director of sales and innovation, DataCash
The rise and rise of multichannel
In 2014 the payments industry will build upon the successes of 2013. We predict that contactless mobile payments – and the integration of mobile devices as a tool for managing spending – will move into the mainstream, bringing us a step closer to a ‘cashless society’. One of the more exciting elements of next year however, will be the rise and rise of multichannel. The growth of shopping across different channels has continued apace throughout the past year and we will soon see a division emerging between those retailers that can keep pace with the market and those who are too slow off the mark.
Rachelle St Ledger, commercial director, retail and ecommerce at PrePay Solutions
