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Lessons from
The world’s largest contactless market also is making prepaid gains, despite low interchange.
world’s largest contactless market by market penetration, with 60 to 70 percent of transactions being contactless as of early 2015. Traditionally dominated by the four “powerhouse” banks—Australia and New Zealand Banking Group (ANZ), Westpac, National Australia Bank and Commonwealth Bank
of Australia—which control more than 85 percent of transaction volumes, Australia also has a well-established local debit net- work, Electronic Funds Transfer
at Point of Sale (EFTPOS), which accounted for approximately 70 percent of debit card transactions in 2014.
“Due to the geographic concentra- tion of the population around urban areas, pilots and scalability have been easy to manage for any new payment innovation,” Omar says.
Down UnDer
By Bill Grabarek, Senior Editor
Payments might not be the first thing that comes to mind when you think of Australia,
but several industry experts contend the country is on the cutting edge. Not only does Australia boast one of the high- est rates of contactless and EMV usage in the world, a largely banked population and a de- creasing dependency on cash,
but its card programs have had
to find success in a country that, for years, has had low interchange rates compared with the rest of the world.
Australia’s mature payments infra- structure has developed early compared with other markets, according to Faisal Omar, mobile financial services and emerging payments director at Sydney-based FMO Consulting. Australia is the