US Newsletter

“Consumers choose to use cash more frequently than any other payment instrument, including debit or credit cards”

The quote above is not conjecture from some industry analyst or trade group, but from the Federal Reserve Bank’s Cash Policy Office in San Francisco. Their “diary study” was conducted in October of 2012 with a random sample of 2,468 participants from across the country. Each participant was asked to record every payment transaction they made — no matter how small — over a period of three days. This included purchases, bill payment, cash withdrawals, etc.
Although the use of electronic forms of payment is increasing, 40 percent of those consumer transactions were cash; followed by debit cards at 25 percent, and credit cards at 17 percent. Electronic methods (online banking bill pay and bank account number payments) account for 7 percent, while checks make up 7 percent. All other payments represent less than 5 percent of monthly transaction activity, with text and mobile payments barely registering at less than one half of one percent.
It was interesting to note that cash usage does change based on the circumstances of the transaction. All income groups tend to use cash most frequently when making person-to-person (P2P) payments. And the average value of those transactions is much higher than the average value of all non-P2P transactions.
Those facts certainly seem to bolster arguments for the use of the ATM channel as a vehicle for convenient, low-cost, nationwide P2P transfers and payments. The complete white paper, “Cash Continues to Play a Key Role in Consumer Spending: Evidence from the Diary of Consumer Payment Choice”, is available for download from the ATMIA website.

Best regards to all,
David
David Tente, Executive Director, ATMIA USA
[email protected]
T – +1-407-833-7906
F – +1-407-323-3123