Online and mobile banking payments are continuing to grow in the country while usage of cheques has dropped to the lowest level since 2008.
That is according to latest figures from the payments monitor of Banking & Payments Federation Ireland.
It finds online and mobile banking payments have jumped 60% since 2018, while the use of cheques halved.
The report shows there were 604 million payment on credit and debit cards in the second quarter of this year, with a total value of €22.7 billion.
Groceries/perishables and restaurants/dining accounted for a vast majority of these payments with the daily spend in the two sectors having reached €43.7 million and €16.1 million, respectively.
These were closely followed by €13.3 million spent daily at fuel stations and other automotive retail outlets.
Commenting on the report, Gillian Byrne, Head of Payments, BPFI said: “Today’s report shows a continued rise in the volumes of online and mobile banking payments in Ireland. In the past five years these types of payments have jumped by 60% between H1 2018 and H1 2023 and direct debt payments increased by 23%. In contrast, cheque usage fell by more than half over the same period.”
“In terms of credit and debit card payments, there were more than 6.6 million payments processed per day in Q2 2023,” she noted.
“In-person payments outnumbered online payments by about three to one with some 4.5 million card payments per day and daily spending reaching almost €120 million. Contactless payments accounted for almost 85% of these transactions in Ireland,” she said.
“Interestingly, 41% of contactless payments were made with mobile wallets instead of physical cards,” she added.
