The Guide to Emerging Technology and Payments

The Guide to Emerging Technology and Payments

What IT and Business Leaders Need to Know

We’ve come a long way from cash and cheques and in a relatively short time. The world of payments both in Australia and globally has fundamentally changed and will continue to evolve quickly. Technology is the culprit as it has been in so many areas of life. Think analogue transactions to digital ones and then consider they are happening every micro-second of every day.

And now there are waves of emerging technology – some of this will come under the umbrella of ‘FinTech’ – generating new change and opportunity. Are you ready and can your organisation adapt? This Tech Research Asia (TRA) report offers an overview of the new technology and provides a guide for IT and business leaders. It also includes:

- An explanation of current payment market trends.

- A brief overview of top eight emerging technologies and why they are important for all organisations.

- A checklist of strategy questions to ask of your own organisation’s approach to payments.

Key Points 

Analogue payments continue to decline in the Australian market, replaced by digital transactions. Cheques are down over 50% and ATM cash withdrawals are down 17% since 2011 while every other payment type is increasing. But it’s not just the payments tech of the past few years’ Australian business and IT leaders need to consider. There is a surge of new technology hitting the market that will impact how you engage with customers via payments.

Blockchain, smart contracts, integrated mobile wallets, security risks, cognitive services, chatbots, VR, and real time payments will have an impact on Australian organisations and their payments approach by the end of 2017. The magnitude of change is uncertain and the intensity of each technology’s impact will differ. However, there is no denying things are evolving quickly. 

For the most part, customers are the ones driving change. They are embracing emerging technology and establishing new expectations for service delivery. Indeed, while many organisations have focused on being ‘customer centric’ with mobile, social, and online channels, they’ll need to once again up their efforts with the new wave of emerging technology. There is no doubt customers are in the driver’s seat when it comes to deciding what the level of expectation should be when they transact with your business.

Recommendations:

Get a multi-stakeholder team (not just IT people) together to explore the opportunities that emerging technology and payments offers you.

Ensure that whatever you do is customer centric and has a strong security and privacy component. Failure to consider these three areas will result in sub-optimal outcomes, regardless of how good your technology implementation is.

Use the checklist in this document to kick-start some new or revitalised thinking about emerging technology and payments. Also, talk to payments providers that have experience in this area and can help guide you to a more innovative, adaptive and secure future.

Click here to download the full report and find out more: