Canadians Say “No Thanks” To Mobile Payments

Only 2 percent of consumer purchases in Canada use mobile payments today, but attitudes among young adults there suggest that mobile buying will pick up soon, according to new research from GfK.

Just 21 percent of Canadian shoppers reported making a mobile payment online or in-store in the past six months, and online purchases made up 64 percent of those mobile payments, while 36 percent were for in-store sales. Mobile payments in Canada pale in comparison to countries like China (83 percent of Chinese shoppers have used mobile payments in the past six months), Korea (62 percent), and even the US (33 percent).

But younger Canadians showed more positive attitudes about mobile payments. Among consumers age 18 to 34, 31 percent agreed that “mobile payments are 100 percent secure,” while that dropped to 22 percent among those 35 to 49, and just 8 percent of those over 50. Younger consumers also said mobile payments were faster than other methods (35 percent for those under 35, 12 percent for those over 50) and that they make shopping more efficient (under-35: 37 percent, over-50: 9 percent).

And more than half of all groups said they were concerned about data breaches and personal information disclosure.

“As usual, Canadians are much more conservative with financial matters, including payment technology,” said Stephen Popiel, Vice President (Consulting) at GfK Canada. But he added that “our findings suggest that Millennials and even younger consumers will eventually accelerate the adoption of mobile payment methods.”