Malaysians confident of going cashless for up to three days

By Digital News Asia July 10, 2018

Contactless payments awareness has increased by 4% to 87% in 2017
More than 50% of Malaysians hold more payments cards than two years ago

Malaysians confident of going cashless for up to three days

MALAYSIANS are increasingly confident of going cashless with six in 10 saying they can go without cash for an entire day and close to half of them (41%) saying they could last three days without cash, according to the 2017 Visa Consumer Payment Attitudes study.

Six in 10 Malaysians have tried going cashless and out of this group, close to 60% of respondents said they have successfully gone cashless for at least a few days.

The recent survey also revealed that Malaysians have increased their use of payment cards compared to a year ago, with the affluent segment driving usage of credit cards.

In fact, more than 50% of Malaysians hold more payments cards than two years ago. Approximately half of the survey respondents indicated a preference for cashless payments.

Contactless payments awareness in Malaysia has also increased by 4% to 87% in 2017. Around two in three Malaysians said that they would choose contactless payments over cash if it was widely available.

“Contactless payments have taken off in Malaysia with more than three million Visa contactless transactions being conducted a month, representing double digit year-on-year growth in terms of spend and number of transactions. It is important for us to continue working with our issuers and merchants to educate consumers in Malaysia that electronic payments can be used not only for large purchases, but also small ticket items.

“Visa contactless payments help to displace cash and are an extremely convenient mode of payment, particularly for small ticket transactions, where consumers need not key in their PIN for purchases below RM250,” said Ng Kong Boon, Visa country manager for Malaysia.

“Findings from Visa’s Consumer Payment Attitudes study reinforce Malaysians readiness to embrace the digitisation of payments as we move towards becoming a cashless society,” he added.

Survey findings also highlighted that eight in 10 Malaysians think that the country can be cashless in less than 15 years, with 19% of them believing it can happen within three years and 39% in four to seven years.