NEW YORK—Mobile wallets still do not offer a use case appealing enough to get consumers to switch over from cards in big numbers, states a new report, which also indicates Apple Pay usage is declining.
“Mobile wallet usage in the U.S. lags other countries, particularly Asia where the government's demonetization policies have helped spur its use. Forrester Research had predicted in 2015 that mobile wallets would become a marketing platform in their own right by 2020, expecting growing adoption. Yet, this prediction is not materializing, other than a few examples such as Alibaba and WeChat in Asia,” the Payments Journal said.
The U.S. counterparts such as Apple Pay or Samsung Pay or Google Wallet are not yet offering any platform rich enough to engage customers, the new outlet said.
“In fact, we see Apple Pay actually losing customers,” the Payments Journal said.
U.S. consumers simply want better shopping experiences that blend the mobile experience to get what they want faster and easier, but it is less often done through these universal mobile wallets and more often driven from merchant based applications that often incorporate loyalty and rewards, “which to date still remain nascent in universal mobile wallets,” the Payments Journal noted.