Rob Crutchington at Encoded takes a look back at some of his previous predictions and offers a new one for 2024.
1. E-commerce will be fuelled by a digital first strategy
At the end of 2021, it was clear that the pandemic had changed everything. As online shopping and home-working spread exponentially, forward-thinking organisations adopted a digital first survive and thrive strategy. At the time, a report by Public First predicted digital technology could grow the economy by over £413 billion by 2030 – around 19% of the UK economy. A few years on and statistics still indicate that growing success in digital technology is good for the economy. Recent research commissioned by the UK government estimates that going digital is likely to increase the UK tech sector’s annual gross value added (GVA) by an additional £41.5 billion by 2025 and create a further 678,000 jobs.
Adopting a digital first strategy is still the way forward for successful businesses, opening up different channels and making it easy for customers to pay securely, anytime, anywhere.
2. Apple Pay and Google Pay will further increase in popularity
In 2022, I predicted Alternative Payment Methods (APMs) such as Apple Pay and Google Pay would continue to gain traction as replacement payment methods for traditional cash, credit and debit cards. According to the latest findings from global market intelligence hub Payments Cards & Mobile, in the UK, digital wallets (such as Apple Pay and Google Pay) are the leading payment methods among consumers shopping online, accounting for 35% of e-commerce transaction values in 2022. Stored payment credentials, fewer clicks to purchase and pre-populated delivery information make digital wallets quick and easy to complete purchases securely.
3. Biometric authentication – the future of payments is here
In 2024, the growing popularity of tech wearables for authorising payments such as Apple Pay and Google Pay will gain momentum especially when combined with biometric authentication. Soon it will be possible to verify a payment without even pulling out a phone. Simply by placing a fingerprint on your watch will be enough for the payment to be approved. It eliminates the need for a passcode or PIN, making stealing payment information more difficult for hackers or fraudsters.
What is more, biometric authentication is set to drive tangible operational and business benefits with industry experts ContactBabel estimating savings of up to 40 seconds off each verification call and reducing the number of calls into the helpdesk by 70% through the automation of simple tasks such as real-time Internet password resets.
Make the complex simple
One thing is clear, whatever the industry predicts, the end goal for contact centres remains the same, to continually find new ways to reduce customer effort, boost performance and protect sensitive payment card data all in one go. Today’s payment challenges may be complex but Encoded will unravel payment complexity and improve the customer experience (CX).
