320 million card payments made in Q1 2021 as ATM withdrawals fall by 44% and cheque usage drops by 26%

26th May 2021 - Banking & Payments Federation Ireland (BPFI) has today published the latest figures from its BPFI Payments Monitor for Q1 2021 which shows electronic payments continued to grow strongly in the first three months of the year with a sharp decline in both ATM withdrawal and cheque volumes.

Speaking on the latest trends, Brian Hayes, Chief Executive, BPFI said: “The latest trends indicate that consumers and businesses continue to move away from cash and paper-based payments. Over the first three months of the year, the Central Bank of Ireland reports some 320 million card payments were made. BPFI data shows that in-store contactless payments, which includes payments with cards as well as mobile wallets such as Apple Pay or Google Pay, made up 47% of those payments. And over the course of the quarter the volumes of contactless payment volumes rose by 12.9% to almost 149 million.”

“This is in stark contrast to cash and paper-based payments with the growth in contactless largely being driven by consumers moving away from cash payments at the point of sale. Our report today shows both the volume and value of ATM cash withdrawals down by 44.3% and 35.7%, respectively, compared with Q1 2020. Cheque usage also saw a sharp decline with volumes falling by 26.3% year on year to 4.9 million. This was the second lowest quarterly volume recorded after 4.8 million in Q2 2020.”