Online and mobile payments continued to grow strongly in the first quarter as cheque payments hit a record low, according to the latest Banking & Payments Federation Ireland (BPFI) payments monitor.
Digital banking transfer volumes, ie credit transfers initiated via personal online or mobile banking, increased 13.2% year-on-year to 34.3m, the highest level recorded since records began in 2016.
Digital banking is also on course to overtake direct debits this year, even though direct debit volumes rose 4.4% from Q1 last year to 35.5m, and cheque volumes hit a new low of 4.5m during the January-March period, half the volume recorded compared to four years ago.
"As consumers continued to reduce their reliance on cash and cheques, online and mobile banking (digital banking) payment volumes grew by 13.2% year on year to 34.3m payments in Q1 2022," said Gillian Byrne, head of payments at BPFI.
"This was the second highest level recorded since BPFI began collecting this data in 2016, after Q4 2021. In fact, digital banking now looks set to overtake direct debits during 2022, even though direct debit volumes increased by 4.4% year on year to 35.5m.
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"Cheque payments meanwhile hit a new quarterly low at only 4.5m, which was about half the volume seen in Q1 2018.”
Quarterly contactless payment volumes rose 53.6% to 228.4m compared to the same period last year when Ireland was largely in lockdown and non-essential retail outlets were closed.
The value of contactless payments rose 59% from a year ago to €3.7bn or €41.6m per day, the second highest daily contactless spend after the four quarter of 2021 (€46.5m).
The average payment value has increased from €15.72 5o €16.20 over the past year, again the second highest quarterly average after Q4 2021.
With 84.8m transactions valued at almost €1.4bn, March 2022 was the second highest month for contactless payments after December 2021, but data for April shows the value of contactless payments slightly outstripped March despite volumes falling to 83.6m.
(Pic: Getty Images)
