ETA Expert Insights: Imagining the Future of Mobile Payments
By the ETA Mobile Payments Committee
Our industry spends a lot of time trying to make our products and services invisible. That is, we try to make payments frictionless so that the end user doesn’t have to think about the process at all. We want consumers to focus on what they’re buying, not how they’re buying. The ETA Mobile Payments Committee works hard to make this seamless shopping experience a reality for everyone by promoting the adoption of mobile payments and identifying ways to expand the opportunities afforded by new technology. Below, the committee steps back and consider what the mobile payments space will look like in 2025.
Q: Fast-Forward to 2025 – what is your wildest idea in terms of what will be hot in the Mobile Payments space?
We may see a significant number of merchants (retail and restaurants) deploy technology that enables an “Uber experience”. Walk in, pick up an item you want to purchase, walk out. Or, finish your meal and just walk out. No interaction with a clerk, waiter, or POS required. It’s hard to predict exactly how this will work, but the process will likely involve a mobile device (phone, wearable, or implant).
“Hey Siri, pay for my items,” – this is the catch-phrase that we might expect to be commonplace in 2025. Envision a world where a consumer will be able to select items in a store and place them in a lightweight, reusable, and biodegradable bag made from hemp. Once they’ve completed their shopping, all that is needed to do is speak those six words and a voice assistant (in this case Siri) will take care of the rest. You will not need to authenticate via TouchID or FaceID, as Siri will use the biometrics of my voice to authenticate the transaction and then leverage Apple Pay to complete the transaction. Also, since Siri will know where you are, based on geolocation, she will be able to also send along that consumer’s loyalty credentials so that they receive a standard double-points or loyalty discount percentage. Talk about hassle-free (and hands-free) commerce.
Other instances of Conversational Commerce (“OK Google, I need a Tall Latte”) are here now and will become much more pervasive in the next 5 years. Starbucks’ integration with Google Assistant is available today across Android, iOS and any Assistant enabled device from a variety of purveyors.
At storefronts, one can envision the Amazon Go type of experience where a consumer effectively walks in, grabs what they want, and walk out. We have the tech today and by 2025 it will be cheap enough to deploy and integrate that many mid-large retailers will have it. In eCommerce, one could expect the checkout experience getting more streamlined as offerings like Apple Pay in Safari grow and the W3C works on the Payment Request API to make the integration of payments simple for merchants.