Survey: Mobile payments less popular than thought

North Palm Beach, Fla. – Despite prevailing expert opinion that mobile payments are popular with modern consumers, this may not actually be the case. A new survey of U.S. consumers conducted by Princeton Research Associates for Creditcards.com shows that only 4% of Americans say they would always use their mobile phone to make a purchase and only 9% said “most of the time.”



In addition, willingness to pay with a mobile phone decreases with age (30% of Millennials say they would never use their cell phone to make a purchase, compared to 38% of 30-49 year-olds, 49% of 50-64 year-olds and 64% of those age 65 and up). However, willingness to pay with a mobile phone increases with education, as 51% of those with a high school education or less say they would never use their cell phone to make a purchase, compared with 36% of college grads.



Willingness to pay with a mobile phone also increases with income. Forty-nine percent of those with annual household income below $30,000 say they would never use their cell phone to make a purchase versus 31% of those with annual household income of $75,000 or above.



Parents are more likely to embrace mobile payments than non-parents (47% of non-parents say they would never use their cell phone to make a purchase compared with 37% of parents). Also, 70% of rural residents say they would never or hardly ever use their cell phone to make a purchase, but only 55% of urban residents say they would never or hardly ever use their cell phone to make a purchase.