Credit Card Issuers Banking on Payment Technology

by Mike Bevel CollectionIndustry.com

If there?s anything the American people need most ? not safer roads, not cleaner air, not the return of Twin Peaks before it got all awful ? it?s more credit cards.

Phones that double as credit cards, machines that generate new credit cards on the spot, vending machines that simply require the flick of a credit-card-bearing wrist. We may not yet have jet packs, but by golly we?re constantly cutting the edge of credit card technology.

Why all these new-fangled credit cards and gadgets? Because the U.S. market, according to some economists, is saturated with the buggers. As pointed out in a Delaware News Journal article, there are nearly a billion credit cards in circulation.

Which makes further growth a challenge.

So, welcome the Future. The cards and gadgetry set up a false needs-met problem/solution dichotomy: you, the consumer, clearly need to spend your money as quickly as possible. Being able to wave your credit card in front of a scanner is what?s going to be the most efficient parting of a fool and his finances this side of state lotteries.

The News Journal article, though, references some consumers not falling for the high-speed hype:

?It?s just as fast as if you swipe,? Clifford Roseboom, Delaware resident and former user of a Chase Wawa card. The card has been touted for its speed in cash register transactions.

What about cyborg technology? The blending of man and machine that went so well for Robocop? David G. Turner, Bank of America credit card executive, closes out the Journal?s story on an ominous note:

?I always have my keys, I always have my cell phone, and I always have my thumb. Those will be the things that indicate where payment technology will go.?

Indeed.