The coronavirus pandemic has completely changed more than a couple of aspects of our day-to-day lives. Most of us are stuck at home, for starters, as movement and travel restrictions only seem to be getting worse.
Our hygiene practices have become significantly more sophisticated, as warding off the virus seems to be on everyone’s mind all the time. To say that the times are turbulent would be an understatement.
However, the SARS-COV-2 pandemic has impacted our lives in ways that we might not even be aware of. Set aside the devastating effect on the economy – our regular consumer habits have quietly changed due to the pandemic.
These days, online payments are gaining more and more prominence and popularity. New platforms are popping up, more eCommerce stores accept new payment platforms, and prominent companies are creating their payment system.
The online payment phenomenon is nothing new, but it has seen a significant rise in popularity due to the pandemic. In this article, we’ll explore online payments, explain why they’re gaining such popularity, and speculate on the probable benefits of online payments as a whole.
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The Effects of COVID19 on Business Markets
The coronavirus pandemic has had a devastating effect on many industries, to the point where some industry giants are struggling to survive. The industries that took the biggest hit are hospitality, traveling, and service.
Due to the many travel and movement restrictions put in place by the government to cut down on the spread of this deadly pandemic, places such as hotels, theaters, restaurants, and many more have been struggling to make ends meet, with a significant amount of them shutting down.
Some businesses, on the other hand, most notably eCommerce businesses, have bloomed during the pandemic. The world’s top three eCommerce platforms, Amazon, eBay, and AliExpress, have all reported significant gains during the pandemic.
While most consumers are a bit tight on the money due to massive job loss, a lot of them are stuck at home and unable to spend their funds elsewhere – so they turn to eCommerce.
Cash is Losing its Value
As a form of currency, cash is both losing its appeal with the masses and, incidentally, its value. Sure, the dollar might be fluctuating all the time, but when we look at the USD’s purchasing power, we’ll see a sharp decline over the past decade.
These days, it’s all about online payments, points, and forms of digital currency. While most of them rely on some actual currencies such as the United States dollar, Chinese yen, or Russian ruble, some are completely unrelated to these currencies.
Take bitcoin as a shining example of a currency that is continually gaining momentum and popularity and is in no way related to the purchasing power of any actual currency, and bitcoin isn’t the only one.
Cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin, Ethereum, Monero, Binance Coin, Litecoin and Ripple are getting more and more popular, and vendors, retailers, and stores are starting to see the trend. That’s why we see more and more companies accept these forms of decentralized currencies. Please visit Coin Market CAP to learn more about these cryptocurrencies.
Unlike most centralized currencies, decentralized currencies such as bitcoin are finite and can’t be inflated, giving them an edge over traditional payment methods.
People Aren’t Moving Freely
Most people around the world are stuck at home, period. While not all places have a complete curfew or movement ban, governments have done their best to minimize the number of people outside, thus successfully cutting down the spread of the deadly pandemic.
Even with the vaccination for the virus gaining more and more prominence, the total number of infected and dead from the pandemic is on a sharp rise – which is why many moving restrictions were put in place .
With more people stuck at home, it’s fair to say that boredom is on the rise. Once people are bored these days, they tend to look for shopping as a way to cope, which has prompted another sharp increase in the use of online payments.
Since systems are getting more sophisticated with the advent of data-driven AI solutions, online payments have become as simple, straightforward, and streamlined as possible.
Online Services & Products are Accelerating
While on the topic of online services, they have changed to accommodate a new wave of users coming in due to the pandemic. More people are using the internet now than they ever were in the past, which has made a lot of managed services and online websites change accordingly.
Online services and products are reaching brand new heights, developing new marketing strategies, and continually finding new ways to appeal to a new kind of prospect – the corona community.
Since the coronavirus has made many people glued to their screens, online retailers, sellers, and commerce companies are developing new SaaS Billing Solutions to accommodate as many people as fast and easily as possible – and it’s working.
With data harvesting, AI, automatic invoices, and a selection of other things, companies are actively making it more appealing and approachable for the everyday consumer.
Things such as accounting, bookkeeping, and invoice payments have all been massively streamlined, saving a lot of time and resources for the companies and adding a lot of convenience to the user experience.
There’s No Risk Involved
Perhaps the best part about online payments is that these days, there’s practically no risk involved. With advanced proxies, security solutions, and many other protective measures put in place both by card companies and the retailers themselves, online payments can be completed in a matter of seconds with the utmost discretion, safety, and simplicity.
Since more and more platforms are developing their online payment platforms and solutions, the race for the safest payment method is on – and the sole beneficiaries of it are the consumers that use the platforms in the first place.
Consumers are Learning About Online Payments
Just because the pandemic has all of us stuck at home doesn’t mean everything has stopped. People are still shopping, be it for clothes, gadgets, or even groceries. Since more people are keen to stay in their homes, the most appealing way to pay for their expenses becomes online payments.
The awareness about online payments has been rising since their inception, but the pandemic has sped this up considerably. More people are learning about online payments due to the pandemic than they ever were in the past – and these consumer habits aren’t likely to change after the pandemic is over.
In Conclusion
The SARS-COV-2 pandemic has shaken a lot of lives up, and it’s safe to say that absolutely no one is happy about it. Worry not, as no pandemic lasts forever, and there is a light at the end of the line. The vaccine has been developed – it’s only a matter of time before the pandemic passes as well.
However, just because the pandemic is going to pass sooner or later, the habits we picked up along the way aren’t likely to change, and the most prominent one of them is probably that people have now become accustomed to things such as online payments.
