December7, 2020LINDA
KIRKPATRICK
PRESIDENT, U.S.ISSUERS,
MASTERCARD INC.
PURCHASE, N.Y. ○ Consumers are now using tap-to-pay
40% of the time in-store, up from only 30% a year
ago, according to Mastercard, an increase of billions
of transactions.It’s not easy to change the daily habits of consumers. But it
happened recently with credit cards—twice. After years of
swiping, American shoppers got used to dipping their cards
at checkout. And then this spring, with the pandemic raging
and the thought of touching anything suddenly scary, they
changed again and started tapping.
Much of the credit goes to Kirkpatrick, who’s spentyears laying the groundwork for tap-to-pay
use in the U.S. The card network says the
technology is clearly better for all parties
concerned. For consumers, tapping is about
10 times faster than dipping. For Mastercard—
as well as its rivals, plus bank issuers and
merchants—faster and more convenient
means more revenue. And research has
shown consumers are increasingly using
tap-to-pay even for smaller transactions,
where cash remains king.
But again, it’s hard to break habits.
Kirkpatrick’s first task was persuading retail-
ers big and small to upgrade their point-of-
sale systems. Then she had to cajole the
biggest banks to speed the rollout of the tap-
ready cards. Finally she had to get consumers
on board. All three tasks took on new urgency
this year.
Early in the pandemic, when stores
were selling out of disinfectant wipes and
hand sanitizer, Kirkpatrick helped shift
Mastercard’s massive marketing budget (per-
haps you’ve seen a “Priceless” ad or two) to
make sure consumers understood how they
could pay quickly without touching anything.
Mastercard also sent out signage that mer-
chants could put up at checkout to let con-
sumers know they accepted the tap-ready
cards. Kirkpatrick has also been working
with the world’s largest banks and other card
issuers, sharing the data the company is see-
ing and helping them speed up their rollout of
contactless cards.
From February to March, according to
Mastercard, contactless transactions at
supermarkets and drugstores grew three
times as fast in the U.S. as noncontactless
transactions. More than half of U.S. consum-
ers have now used some form of contactless
payments part of the time. “Totally mind-
blowing,” Kirkpatrick says. The growth hasn’t
been only in the U.S.: In June global contact-
less in-person transactions increased from the previous
year in every retail category.
For Kirkpatrick, the strongest sign that tap-to-pay tech-
nology was here to stay came when she was scrolling
through social media and happened upon a video posted
by a popular fast-food chain telling consumers how to
do it even while ordering at the drive-thru. “That was a
place—the drive-thru—where some merchants were strug-
gling to invest in the technology, because sometimes you
have to replace that entire unit that you talk into,” she
says. “When I saw that, I knew we had hit a tipping point.”
—Jenny SuraneKirkpatrick in
Westchester
County in
New York
B Photograph by
Brad Ogbonna