The modern consumer is an ever-changing force that is taking control of the payments industry, writes Robert Murphy, the head of Customer Service & Logistics at Chip & PIN Solutions, a Valitor company.

If businesses fail to recognise the power of the modern consumer, they will not survive the new era of retail. Consumers expect a simple and frictionless customer experience, that accommodates their busy  life. This means businesses must adapt in order to meet the digital needs of their customers. Decision-makers must listen to their customers in order to offer the correct payments system. The end-users are the experts in purchasing, so businesses should take action to accommodate their ever changing needs.

According to Gartner, uncertainty in the service experience is the underlying reason for much of the frustration and disappointment in the customer experience. It is therefore critical that businesses can prevent this service uncertainty through preparing for the future demands of the digital consumer to ensure that they can offer flexible payment systems that do more than just accept electronic payments, but can adapt and respond to the demands of the consumer.

Count on contactless
It’s 2018 and contactless transactions are more or less the standard. This might not be surprising considering 2017 marked ten years of contactless cards being introduced in the UK. It’s no surprise that the rise of electronic transactions is forecast to increase. Consumers no longer just use cards for touchpoints and terminals, but emerging technologies such as biometric scanning are soon becoming popular methods for completing transactions.

On-demand payments
Consumer needs are changing as fast as digitalisation itself. No matter if you’re a multinational enterprise or a local business – accepting mobile transactions is no longer enough. Businesses must use a payments system that reflects the on-demand customer experience. They need a payments system that offers their customers choice, seamlessness and flexibility.

In an age where financial fraud is almost inevitable, businesses must not only offer an ‘on-demand’ payments system, but also consider secure technologies, such as tokenisation. Tokenisation is essentially card storage, but it is a critical tool for retailers to adopt a flexible and safe customer experience. Card details are substituted in the form of unique tokens that are sent to and from the merchant and the bank. Using tokenisation eliminates the need for card details to be seen by the merchant and therefore mitigates the risk of fraud and makes transactions more secure. Ultimately tokenisation benefits the end consumer through enabling them to purchase and return through different channels. For example, a consumer can purchase online and then get a refund in-store. Using unique tokenisation, enables card details to be accessed quickly and securely through any channel and therefore is an agile solution for today’s ever-changing consumer landscape.

Meet the needs of the consumer
Businesses need to utilise the full benefits of mobile transactions and consider how they will feed into their entire customer experience. Integrating payments into your wider systems, such as your POS systems, will make the customer experience more succinct. The payment is the final stage of a customer’s journey, but businesses can forget that this is a make or break moment.

Today’s customer experience is all about creating a smooth journey, whether this is from entering to exiting a store, or Googling a site and receiving a purchase through the post. Creating a seamless payment experience is critical in order to not disrupt the customer experience.

Mobile payments are not a recent phenomenon, but the fast-changing demands of the consumer means businesses must realise the full potential of mobile transactions and the impact they can have on customer experience. If used correctly, mobile payments can offer more than just choice. They can offer an agile service for your consumers – and this is what they’re asking for.