Consumers are still spending much less by paying with cards than they withdraw from ATMs even though payment by card surged during the crisis and people are now using cards to pay even for their low-value daily shopping. The average transaction value has been going down in the last few years to RON120 in the first quarter.
Average payment at a POS is still far below any other European country. According to Visa, about 40% of the cardholders do not keep their cards in their wallets at all times, and instead keep them at home after withdrawing their entire wage in the cash.
“We need to persuade people to keep their cards in their wallets and then give them the same degree of control over the money on their cards as they have over their cash, by introducing phone or email alerts. If these two basic conditions are met, then we’ll convince people to use their cards to make payments every day,” says Catalin Cretu, Visa Europe’s general manager for Romania.
Romanians performed 54 million cash withdrawal transactions in the first quarter, taking RON500 on average or one third of the average net monthly wage. There were 11 million active cards in the system by the end of March, as well as 10,900 ATMs and almost 125,000 POS-es. (EUR1=RON4.3428)
(English version by Loredana Fratila-Cristescu)