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Will Mobile Payments Make Plastic Cards Outdated?

Global-mobile-paymentsThere was a time when people used to be fascinated with video recorders and video cassettes. And owning one was a matter of pride and you had the luxury of watching Bruce Lee or Sylvester Stallone race through the landscape on horseback driving out the evil from the world. But it's been more than a decade now that these recorders have become obsolete and now you have the luxury of watching a life size film with high definition picture resolution.

With the advent of the smartphone and various handheld devices, a similar situation might crop up, at least that is what is being anticipated of late especially by the ones that use plastic cards at the drop of a pin. So, experts are of the opinion that plastic cards will become outdated if people start making payments through mobiles or their hand held devices.

As per studies conducted by Gartner, mobile payments will skyrocket and payments will reach USD$720 billion annually by the year 2017. This is a whopping increase by USD$235 billion as compared to the earlier years. However, these days, there are many individuals that still move around with a pack of plastic cards. It has been reported that plastic card transactions account for more than USD$75 billion annually and the value is USD$4.7 trillion.

The stalwarts like American Express, Visa, MasterCard, PayPal, and Google have fostered mobile payment facilities. It has also been assessed that Starbucks's app is the most widely used app when it comes to digital mode of payment. It has also been estimated that digital payment gateway usage increased by 14% annually as compared to the previous years. Since it is being anticipated that plastic cards will become outdated, most of the card companies are trying hard to introduce new systems like digital wallet. But, experts are of the opinion that the plastic cards will not be obsolete any time in near future.

However, there are many that still use plastic cards for making payments online. But this is quite cumbersome as you will be required to enter the 16 digit number and if at all you forget the password or the PIN, you have to go through a rigorous process of obtaining a temporary PIN and so on. For this reason, most of the people are avoiding making payments with plastic cards and opting for mobile payment instead. If you want to know more about card imaging and designing, you can visit http://www.cimitaly.com/ for more information.

As far as cards are concerned, you have the option to use debit cards, credit cards, and of course there are prepaid cards that are being used like hot cakes all over the world. The main advantage of prepaid cards is that the expense is at your disposal. You can spend only as much as you want to fill or load the card accordingly.

The debit cards are also good as it is linked to your bank account and when you spend it will be withdrawn directly from your bank account. So, you will be able to spend only within the available currency limit you have in your bank account.

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