Ireland’s largest provider of retail and web payment solutions, has announced that they have reached 6,000 contactless payment terminals in Ireland.
Contactless payment cards are just beginning to emerge in Ireland, 6,000 Irish Sage Pay retailers have installed the machines. In the UK, over 143,000 card machines have been installed in the market as a whole . By the end of 2013, 2.4 million Laser cards are due to be replaced with Visa Debit Contactless Cards enabling consumers to use contactless payment methods. Consumers are opting to carry less cash, last year alone Laser and Visa cards accounted for €25bn worth of sales in Ireland.
Sean Wilson, Sage Pay said, “Ireland is increasingly becoming a cashless society. Allowing customers to make low value payments by debit and credit card can be a top-heavy cost to retailers. By looking at accepting contactless payments this will help them reduce those costs.”
Wilson continued, “There is also a huge value to customers, recent figures report that Irish customers spend 11.2 minutes queuing daily to pay for low-value purchases . Contactless payments help eliminate these lengthy queues.”
Brain Maher Manager of Centra, Errigal Road, Driminagh said, “Most of the transactions that we process by card are for low values. Our aim is to offer customers a great shopping experience with quick, easy ways to pay. Since installing contactless payment terminals, it has allowed us to improve the service we offer our customers. The new technology should help to reduce transaction and queuing times.”
Retailers currently using contactless payment systems include Sage Pay partner CBE’s grocery and convenience clients: Musgrave, Spar, Centra and Costcutter.
There are very low levels of security risk to using contactless payments. The customer is limited to €15 per single transaction. Once a customer spends a maximum of €45 across any number of retail outlets they will automatically be asked for their pin to prove that your card is actually yours.
