adyenthe global financial technology platform chosen by the world’s leading companies, shows the behavior in purchasing decisions of consumers throughout Spain through its latest Report on Payment Methods 2023.
For this reason, when analyzing the data by autonomous communities, it is revealed that the south of Spain adopts deferred payment to a greater extent and that the first place as the favorite payment method in all communities is the credit card, with exceptions such as Asturias where the use of cash predominates (86%).
Habits among the Spanish: deferred payment and credit cards
Given the current global situation that we are going through, more and more forms of financing are required to make purchases. Deferred payment offers a great advantage in this sense, financial flexibility for consumers of all kinds. In our market, more than half of consumers (55%) claims to have used deferred payment at some point. Specifically, the communities that claim to use the deferred payment more in our country are Canary Islands and Andalusia (both around 70% of users). This can be understood by the use of this payment alternative in the face of current economic instability, given that, according to 2021 INE (National Statistics Institute) studies, Andalusia is among the most impoverished communities on the Spanish map, with 18,906 euros. and the Canary Islands, with 18,990 euros per inhabitant.
For their part, Catalan users consider that they now pay more with their mobile phones through electronic wallets (ApplePay, Google Pay, Amazon Pay, etc.) than in cash (40%), a figure only surpassed by the Canary Islands, with more than Half of the respondents from this region agree with this statement (55%).
With regard to the investment and behavior of Spanish companies, they especially value including this type of option, such as offering incentives through means of payment to build customer loyalty (84%) and consider that they will offer more and more options deferred payment (82%).
Regarding the Spanish payment methods, 82% opt for credit/debit cards. In all the communities it leads the first place as the favorite payment method, with exceptions such as Asturias where the use of cash predominates (86%).
If we analyze the progress of digital payment methods such as e-wallets, we can see how Madrid is one of the communities where they are used the most (31%), however the use of in the Balearic Islands (47%) and the Canary Islands (42%). This is probably due to the adaptation of businesses to foreign payment methods, given that in sectors such as hospitality this plays an important role in customer loyalty.
For their part, when observing the behavior of Spanish companies, 50% of them consider that it is important to offer the foreign public their local payment methods, It is a way to increase your confidence. Followed by 37% who consider that the more payment methods offered and available, the more sales opportunities there will be.
When forecasting the future of purchasing habits in the autonomous communities, it is possible to observe how Spaniards will be conditioned by the new payment methods that will be implemented. Among the respondents from the Community of Madrid, Andalusia, the Canary Islands and Galicia, 4 out of 10 consider that e-wallets and virtual cards will replace completely to credit/debit cards in format physical. For their part, users from Aragon, Asturias and Catalonia advocate more for the extinction of cash within their shopping routines. Finally, 8 out of 10 Spanish consumers believe that the technological investments will favor the shopping through different digital payment methods (85%).
It reveals how, for the most part, Spanish users prioritize companies offering discounts and promotions over having multiple payment options and being able to choose the one that suits them best, except for Catalonia, where 61% of users prefer this option . For this reason, customer loyalty and personalization of the experience throughout the country are essential requirements for buyers today. In this new report on payment methods we found that 7 out of 10 respondents (74%) offer promotions.
As a result of the changes of the last three years, where the conduct of the purchasing processes within each sector has been transformed, we can observe the growth in the penetration of purchases through marketplaces, a particularly notorious habit in Catalonia (71% of its buyers) or Asturias (80%).
For their part, 75% of those surveyed in Spain admit that they will opt for buy in a physical store in shopping centers / hypermarkets. When analyzing by region, we can find that 8 out of 10 buyers in C. de Madrid opt for this type of business to make their purchases, while other communities prefer to opt more for local commerce, such as Galicia (86%), the Canary Islands (78%) or Catalonia (76%).