13th December 2023
The way payments landscape continues to evolve, it is imperative for travel merchants to support local payment preferences wherever they have a presence or intend to expand.
This ongoing assessment entails being up-to-date with what can emerge as an alternative via payment method, supporting acceptance for the same and sustaining connections with payment processing specialists, including acquirers in the region, for delivering on multiple counts, including CX, associated cost and conversion.
In a webinar, titled State of Payments in Asia 2023: with 2024 Outlook, held today, mentioned that priorities for a merchant belonging to the travel industry are going to vary depending on a country or market being targeted, but considering the growing e-commerce environment, merchants need to:
- Focus on popular payment methods,
- Facilitate easy mechanism for one to pay,
- Ensure payment methods can be added with ease,
- Ensure speed of settlement, and
- Protect against fraudulent transactions and data hacks
Looking into the crystal ball, he said, there are several trends that (have either strengthened or matured) must be delved into:
- More transactions will take place “in-app” and “in-wallet”
- Buy now pay later is here to stay but changing (consolidation of BNPL specialist providers, entry of wallet providers like PayPal, and an increase in card-funded BNPL which are all invisible to the merchant and at no extra cost to the merchant). In case of BNPL, regulatory involvement, interest rate pressure in addition to the battle among various players have changed the face of the sector.
- Growth in A2A payments in the e-commerce category (driven by real-time payment rails)
- Tokenisation will become the norm
- Digital ID will decrease friction for provision of customer data
- AI and machine learning paying the way for low friction fraud detection
Referring to A2A payments, Ojerholm said, “Merchants are drawn to A2A as they reduce the cost of payment acceptance versus cards while offering instant settlement of funds, and consumers are drawn to A2A payments owing to their safety, simplicity and speed.” He added even card schemes are getting into real-time payments. According to a report by FIS earlier this year, global A2A transaction value surpassed $525 billion in 2022 and is projected to grow at 13% CAGR through 2026.
“When the customer wants to pay, don’t get in the way,” highlighted Ojerholm, referring to the approach of Australian company Chemist Warehouse.
By Ritesh Gupta, Ai Events
