Money On The Move

The future of travel payments includes mobile wallets, virtual numbers and lots of discarded plastic

- Erica Stevens

The popularity of mobile wallet apps – such as the ones by Apple, Samsung, and Google – seems predestined to grow. Convenience and smartphones are consumers’ two big loves, and no one can argue with the benefits of using a device that’s already glued to our palms for all sorts of other purposes to pay for goods and services as well.

But the advantages of mobile payments go beyond ease of experience. With added safeguards against fraud and the improvements in reporting they could make possible, business travelers stand to benefit from mobile payments at least as much as average consumers, and maybe more.

Despite their obvious attraction, mobile payments are still a novelty in North America. Jennifer Petty, head of global corporate card for Bank of America Merrill Lynch, estimates that less than ten percent of all consumer payments are made via mobile devices, and adds that corporations aren’t using mobile payments at all. “Processing systems and things are getting ready,” she explains. “It’s just not what clients are screaming for, so that’s not what we’re investing in yet.”

Perception vs Reality

In part, security concerns are fueling the choice to use plastic, even where mobile payments are accepted. Amid all the well-publicized security breaches at large retailers, consumers recoil from technology they believe could present new opportunities for fraud. And corporations have voiced worries, too. A survey of managed travel buyers in 2012 by AirPlus International found that 30 percent thought mobile payments were less secure than plastic.