In the coming year, low-value payments and prepaid cards will be increasingly mentioned in the same breath, especially in conjunction with off-line, contactless methods, says Gwenn Bezard, partner in Aite Group.
Pilots, and even some deployments of contactless payment cards, will be making a significant appearance, if only because banks are pushing them. The main sticking point from the merchant perspective, Bezard says, will be the cost of interchange, but he expects some banks to offer breaks on fees, if only to give the venue a running start. He is optimistic that big merchants will follow Starbucks’ model and offer rechargeable, merchant-specific stored-value cards as a means of gaining market share and promoting customer loyalty.