Your real challenge is to make us change our habits.

On May 18, Bizum will activate payment in physical stores via NFC: you bring your mobile phone close to the dataphone and that’s it, just like with Apple Pay or Google Pay. No PIN, no card and no cash. A platform with 31 million users in Spain takes the leap that makes it a direct competitor of Visa and Mastercard at the physical point of sale.

The problem is that banks and businesses want to make that leap. The consumer, at the moment, has no compelling reason to move.

Why it is important. For ten years, Bizum has only generated costs for banks, which have invested a lot of money in creating and maintaining it. The jump to physical commerce changes that equation: businesses will pay a commission for each transaction, as they already do with cards, but predictably lower as international intermediaries disappear. There is the business that Spanish banks have been waiting for for a decade. And businesses also win: they get paid instantly, compared to 24-48 hours for traditional card settlement.

The user, on the other hand, pays exactly the same as before. Just with another environment.

In detail. The gesture will be identical to today’s contactless card: you bring your mobile phone close to the dataphone and in seconds it is done. The user can do so from their bank’s app (which will incorporate the functionality) or from Bizum Paya new digital wallet available on Android and iOS that works similarly to Apple Pay or Google Pay.

The difference compared to paying with a virtual card in the wallet is that money travels as an instant transfer from account to account. Some details:

• Businesses will not have to change their dataphone: it will be enough to update the terminal software.
• Bizum Pay will allow you to add a bank card as a backup method: if the payment fails, the system automatically changes without you having to swipe your mobile again.

The big question. Why would someone who already pays without any hassle with their card, or with Apple Pay, or with Google Pay, change their habit? Inertia is the silent enemy of any new payment method. And in this case it is huge.

The most logical answer is incentives: cashbackdiscounts in specific establishments, or any mechanism that makes the user feel that the change is worth it.

The data of the ecommerce point in that direction: when Bizum eliminated the friction of entering card information in online stores, users quickly adopted it and today it is the second favorite payment method for buying online, with a share of 20-30% (which is not bad, but it is not something to write home about either). The equivalent in the physical world is yet to come.

Yes, but. May 18 won’t be the big launch the date suggests. CaixaBank, Sabadell and Bankinter will go in the first wave, Santander will delay its incorporation to the fall. The massive deployment, including a campaign, is expected in September or October. And that Mercadona is already negotiating advantageous commissions before the service starts says a lot about where this battle is really going to be fought.

Go deeper. What is at stake goes beyond Spain. Bizum is negotiating with equivalent platforms in Italy, Portugal and the Nordic countries to build a European payments system that could reach more than 130 million citizens. The business model established in Spanish stores this year will be the template on which this continental project is built.

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Featured image | Xataka with Mockuuups Studio