Cashless society just around corner

May 5, 2005

Cashless society just around corner

New Zealand is well on the way to becoming a truly cashless society.

“The increasing pace of our lifestyles means that increasing numbers of New Zealanders are choosing electronic banking, simply because of its convenience,” KPMG’s Banking and Finance Group Deputy Chairman, Godfrey Boyce, said today.

Mr Boyce was commenting on statistics revealed in KPMG’s 19th annual Financial Institutions Performance Survey which showed a 10.6 percent increase in the number of EFTPOS transactions in 2004. This came on a 14.9 percent increase in the previous year.

In 2004, 741 million EFTPOS transactions were conducted in New Zealand with a total value of $41.3 billion.

“This represents a transaction being made by every man, woman and child in New Zealand once every two days,” Mr Boyce said.

Helping drive this growth was a 20 percent increase in the number of EFTPOS terminals to nearly 120,000 throughout New Zealand. This is the largest increase recorded in the past five years.

The number of ATM terminals grew to just over 2,000. There was an increase of almost 25 percent in the number of customers doing their banking over the internet, representing almost 30 percent of all bank customers.

Mr Boyce said customers needed to be on their guard about internet banking fraud in the same way they should be aware of protecting a PIN number or credit card number.

“The challenge now for the banks in terms of online banking is to get the balance right between efficiency and ease of use and safeguarding the security of their customers,” he said.

ENDS

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