6 Reasons Convenience & Fuel Will Turn to Mobile Payment

The adoption of mobile payment methods by consumers over the last 5 to 10 years has skyrocketed. People are now more trusting of and accustomed to using their smartphones to do far more than find out the weather forecast or download a fitness app. The ease with which the average consumer can now make a quick payment over a phone is turning it into common practice, and the demand for this ease across other mediums is expectedly increasing. Likewise, considering that today there are more mobile devices in the world than there are people, it’s fair to assume that the sheer accessibility of smartphones is a large driving factor behind the need for mobile pay options.

How does mobile payment fit into convenience and fuel?

In a fast-paced world where time is so valuable to a consumer, making their purchase as simple and efficient as possible is of the utmost importance. Applying mobile payment technology to a forecourt or c-store enables customers to complete their transactions swiftly and with minimal fuss. In some cases, when refuelling vehicles customers can even make their payment via an app without needing to leave their seat! Grocery barcodes can also be scanned via an assortment of shopping apps on mobiles, seeing customers scan all of their items before they even reach the checkout counter.

Better still, Google has designed a ‘Hands Free’ app specifically for retail purchases that permits users to make in-store payments without needing to take their phones out of their pocket! Instead, smartphones detect the store they are buying from and cashiers are told “I’ll pay with Google”, at which point their identification is verified using their initials and photo recognition via the store’s Google profile, and a notification is sent to them after completing their purchase.

According to Visa’s most recent Digital Payments study, 74% of people are using their smartphones to either manage their money or else actively make payments. Suffice to say, it’s clear that there is a considerable opportunity to take advantage of this innovation within convenience and fuel.

Six reasons you should be using mobile payment

1. Guide customers straight to your door
2. A memorable customer experience
3. Brand loyalty
4. Intelligent decision-making
5. Significant savings
6. Enhanced security

Geo-location and Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE) beacons can now use customer smartphones to alert them to the nearest ‘smart’ pumps within their area, recognise the site, have them verify the pump number and they’re away. This also extends to corporate vehicles, wherein the app the company uses can be associated with a specific fuel card or corporate fleet account for easy, trackable purchases.

If your EPOS technology is impressing your customers, then adding mobile payment will take you even closer to really creating the right kind of retail experience for them. Making things easy and being flexible, then it’s very possible they’ll more willingly return to relive the same experience again. Customers will be happier in the knowledge that they can rely on you for an exceptional service, increasing their trust in your brand. This in turn could mean greater revenue for your business in the long run, and will undoubtedly help raise your profile.

Loyalty schemes can be made simple with mobile payments, allowing you to implement your own programs and targeted campaigns based on your customer’s purchases. By rewarding them with frequent offers or discounts, they feel valued and may even begin to use your services on a more regular basis. Certain mobile payment options can include condensing all of your customers’ cards into one – making the purchase and giving them their loyalty points in one automatic transaction.

Mobile payment can also pave the way for smarter data management, tracking your customers’ purchases to better inform your stock promotions and pricing. This insight into customer activity offers more comprehensive data, enabling you to provide them with a more personalised experience, every time.

By using new mobile payment technology within retail, this dramatically reduces any transaction fees from integrated card payments and helps to minimise over-staffing thanks to the growing need for automated ‘mobile-ready’ check-out systems.

Some customers are held back from relying on mobile payments due to the implications of security. However, there are lots of highly secure methods of completing smartphone transactions. Apple, for example, has ensured that payments via Apple Pay are limited by a maximum spend. Developers are now also looking to introduce iris scanning technology to smartphones in the near future, which has proved to be far more successful than fingerprint and vocal recognition. In addition to this, mobile payment is ensuring that the potential for fraud is greatly reduced as name and card details will no longer need to be visible.

Make the move to mobile payment

There’s no doubt that mobile payment is increasingly going to influence consumer behaviour in the convenience and fuel sector. Its popularity is growing fast as is accessibility to the technology that will power the facilities to make this happen. If you haven’t implemented a mobile pay solution, perhaps it’s time for you to take a look?

If you’d like to learn more about mobile payment technology and what it could do for your business, please get in touch.