10427 The Retailer Autumn 2018_Final Draft Pages

Any movement away from expensive card payments reduces interchange and scheme fees for merchants.

The high street is finding new ways to compete, and we expect to see increasingly innovative collaborations merging fashion, food and fun along with product personalisation and tech.

decline, so it seems reasonable to ask: is it still ultimately feasible to achieve a cashless society? For merchants in the majority of European countries, it seems a cashless society still poses risks, including lost sales, negative press, and an open-door for the global card schemes to increase their dominance. IN SUMMARY The payments space is rapidly changing, but many of the alternative payment systems predicted and touted over the years have failed to materialise to the extent predicted – if they have attained any permanent presence at all. Many well publicised and promoted mobile payment solutions have either been acquired or failed outright. Open Banking could change this, and potentially provide much needed competition for Visa and Mastercard, along with innovations that could improve speed, cost and security for all. To learn more about Open Banking and the future of payments attend the Retail Payments Conference 2018 in London on

November 7th. Join over 120 of Europe’s largest retail organisations, register at www.retailpayments.org.

ALI COMBES // Acombes@cmspi.com // cmspi.com

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