Transaction Trends

Find an average American’s wallet on the street in 2017 and you could expect to see former President Ulysses S. Grant’s face, or perhaps a pair of Jacksons and a Hamilton, staring back you from some cold cotton banknotes. Not so in 2018, a new study from ETA member Paysafe Group has found.

According to PaySafe’s latest “Lost in Transaction” report, the average American carries on average $42 in cash, down $8 over 2017. Further, 55 percent of Americans report to be carrying fewer dollars and cents this year, the report found. The study, which surveyed consumers in the US, UK, Canada, Germany and Austria on their payments habits and interests, wasn’t flush with good news for cash-haters, though.

After all, despite decreasing cash carrying trends, paper money remains the most popular payment method across the five countries, with 87 percent of respondents using the form of payment in the past month. Still, 2 in 3 reported to use debit card/chip and PIN monthly, and 1 in 10 reported monthly usage of mobile wallets. And among the mobile wallet users, 84 percent said they are more convenient than cash and 85 percent said they expected their usage to rise over the next two years.

Across all five countries, nearly 1 in 4 reported monthly usage of contactless payment types; unsurprisingly, the UK and Australia reported the highest contactless monthly usage, at 54 percent and 32 percent respectively, the survey found.

Contactless payments have yet to reach widespread use in the United States. Among the monthly users, 61 percent say they prefer merchants that accept contactless payments and that they are more convenient than carrying cash. However, according to the report, only 3 percent of Americans use contactless payments on a monthly basis.

View the full report from PaySafe here.