A clear trend

The smartphone is increasingly becoming a wallet

Hardly anyone goes out without a smartphone - how practical if you can pay with it.(Bild: Xavier Lorenzo)

Always to hand, and hopefully always sufficiently charged: the smartphone! In Switzerland, cashless payments are booming thanks to a joint digital solution backed by several financial institutions. In Austria, customers rely on their bank's app. 

"Who invented it?" When answering this question, people still immediately think of the Ricola sugar brand, even though the pioneering spirit of a payment system is also causing a sensation: Twint.

The digital solution is one of the most popular Swiss brands, CEO Markus Kilb told the delegation from the Upper Austrian Chamber of Commerce's banking and insurance division when they met him at the company's headquarters in Zurich.

QR codes have to be scanned in order to pay at checkouts. To transfer money to one person, the other person's cell phone number is sufficient. The motto: it should be as easy as possible.

Paying almost exclusively via smartphone: Michaela Keplinger-Mitterlehner, Chairwoman of the Upper Austrian Chamber of Commerce's Banking and Insurance Division, Stefanie Christina Huber (left) and business delegate Patrick Sagmeister.(Bild: Barbara Kneidinger)

The company, which is backed by several banks, now has five million users. "It really draws you in," confirmed Patrick Sagmeister, Austria's business delegate in Switzerland.

The smartphone is increasingly becoming a wallet - this phenomenon is also on the rise in Austria. "I pay for almost everything with my cell phone - two years ago I couldn't have imagined that," revealed Michaela Keplinger-Mitterlehner, Upper Austria's banking spokesperson and Deputy CEO of Raiffeisenlandesbank Oberösterreich.

Austrians rely on the respective app of their bank. "We are constantly working on making it even more convenient for customers to use," confirmed Stefanie Christina Huber, CEO of Sparkasse Oberösterreich and deputy chairwoman of the division. For whom is cashless payment particularly important? "The younger the people, the more important," says Huber.