Carrying around annoying coin money could soon be a thing of the past for the consumer. The new solution is called NFC-enabled smartphone with payment function. NFC is a wireless transmission technology used for contactless data exchange between devices; Paying is just one of many applications. The radio standard was specifically developed for the short range of ten centimeters to make spying on the transmitted data more difficult.
Capturing, capturing and also passing on information as if passing by is the goal of the technology. Not least because of the huge range of possible uses of the solution is predicted a meteoric rise. For the end user, this solution promises clear benefits - not least on the convenient payment function. For the trade, for service providers and tradesmen, there are great opportunities and challenges.
Goodbye cash?
The biggest achievement of NFC, however, is undoubtedly cashless payment. Who does not know the situation at the parking machine or in the tram, if the small change in the stock market is not enough and the machine just refuses to accept banknotes? Equipped accordingly, the NFC-enabled smartphone can bring the rescue here. For this to work, it requires an NFC-enabled POS terminal. It is enough to hold the smartphone to the appropriate reader. Many cities in Germany are currently equipping their ticket machines and car park terminals with the new technology in order to offer this service. More and more big fast food, coffee shop and retail chains as well as supermarkets, discounters and petrol stations in Germany are investing in the necessary terminals. The payment processes are significantly accelerated. Even if only a few customers use the offer today, the investment focuses on customer service and at the same time ensures their own future viability.Because the trend is clear: The cash in the wallets is falling significantly: Younger age groups have on average barely 66 euros cash with falling tendency, as a study of the German Federal Bank on payment behavior in Germany from the year 2014 revealed. Accordingly, the share of cash payments has declined sharply in recent years. Only just under half of all sales are still paid in cash today. After all, more than a third of Germans (36 percent) can now imagine paying for cashless payments in everyday life in the future. In the group of 14- to 49-year-olds, it is almost half (46 percent). This was the result of a representative survey commissioned by digital association Bitkom in early 2015.
A must at the PoS
At the same time, end consumers are becoming incomprehensible when it comes to paying in cash - especially with larger amounts. Customer satisfaction does not fall from the sky. It is the result of hard work and convincing services and should not stop at the payment process. So if you want to make it easy for your customers, you can offer them convenient, cashless payment options, even as a small trader or trader. For the "how", there is now a good selection of solutions for every need. An elegant solution, for example, is to accept EC and credit cards via smartphone and a small card reader (mPOS). Thus, the provider has his money safe and all parties are spared to run with larger amounts of cash through the area.
