Many cash payments are continuing to migrate to debit card, but it’s also possible to see the demise of plastic at the hands of the mobile phone. That's according to the UK Payments Council's latest report, The Way We Pay.

Cheque usage continues to fall, halving every five years, hand-in-hand with our reliance on cash, particularly for our regular payments and higher value spontaneous payments. For example in 2001, 40 per cent of home rental payments were made in cash and 43 per cent of our retail spending by value used notes and coins too. By 2011, landlords collected only just over a quarter of rents in cash, while only 30 per cent of shopping was paid for in this way (with the majority of payments being under £5). The rise of the debit card has been responsible for the decline of cash on the High Street - indeed debit card spending has risen almost fourfold since 2001- while Direct Debits have completely changed the way we make our regular payments.

We still make a lot of very small cash transactions (three out of five of our one-off payments) but contactless could make inroads here as 91 per cent are under £25. Currently, most contactless payments are made using a debit or credit card upgraded with the new technology, but soon mobile phones could do the job instead. By 2021, consumer spending is forecast to be roughly 45 per cent higher, but the use of cash is expected to have fallen one per cent, and cards may also be in decline by then.

Adrian Kamellard, chief executive of the Payments Council, says: “We scarcely notice the steady changes in the way we pay, yet someone in their thirties today will see more change in their lifetime than in the entire history of money. Even recent innovations such as payment via a mobile phone, which ten years ago some felt to be science fiction, will soon be commonplace. The 2000s were the decade of the debit card. The 2010s are likely to be the decade of the mobile phone. Just as we can’t imagine how we ever did without the internet, many people will soon wonder how we used to be so dependent on cash and cheque. Twenty years from now even cards may seem archaic."

He adds: "The quiet revolution in payments has enabled the creation of whole new industries such as e-shopping, it has changed our behaviour, and it has reduced transaction costs, and increased the speed and efficiency with which we can all pay each other. The next ten years will see even faster change. It’s easy to imagine a future where we merely pat our pockets for our keys and phone. The wallet could become a historical curiosity.”

Share Story: