North Americans actually among the cheapest and least willing potential users

[This article was posted on June 15, 2009 on the website of ABA Banking Journal, www.ababj.com, and is copyright 2009 by the American Bankers Association.]  

By This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it , executive editor

The good news: 53% of consumers surveyed worldwide say they are at least comfortable with using a mobile device for financial transactions. The bad news: 59% of those consumers are not willing to pay extra for the service. And comfort ranks lowest among North Americans.

North American banks lag the world in making mobile banking available to customers.   Only 31% of respondents in North America said that their bank offers mobile banking, versus 71% in Latin America; 60% in the Middle East/Africa; 53% in Europe; and 50% in Asia. And North Americans are least likely, worldwide, to be willing to pay extra for mobile banking, with 85% declining to pay.

This comes from “Consumers & Convergence,” a survey of more than 4,000 respondents in 19 countries who owned either a mobile phone, PDA, or Blackberry. The survey was conducted by KPMG between September and November 2008. About 17% of the sample was based in North America.

The 53% reported above divides further into 14% that were very comfortable with using mobile banking, and 39% that were somewhat comfortable. The remaining 47% said they were not at all comfortable with mobile banking, indicating that the industry still has quite a sales job ahead of it.

Just over half of the worldwide sample indicated that their current bank offers mobile banking, but only 19% of them have chosen to avail themselves of the service. The survey found that the main concern of those not using the service is security and privacy breaches.

Actual usage of mobile devices for banking varied widely around the world. In the Middle East/Africa region of the study, which included Saudi Arabia and South Africa, 27% of the sample uses mobile devices for banking or payments. The North American region showed the lowest rate of use, at 3%. And North Americans were the most likely group to report lack of comfort with mobile banking—66% said they were “not at all comfortable” with it.

Surprisingly, there was little disparity among age groups. While 35-44 year olds were most likely to use mobile banking over the next year, with 42% expressing willingness, trends weren’t much different among certain other groups. Among these were: 25-34 year-olds, 41% willing, and 45-54, 38% willing.

At the extremes, there was more variation, with 16-24 year olds being much more likely, and consumers 65 and older much less comfortable, than among the other groups. BJ
 

 [This article was posted on June 15, 2009 on the website of ABA Banking Journal, www.ababj.com, and is copyright 2009 by the American Bankers Association.]