Disruption of card payment terminals Digital association sees no reason to panic despite problems
Bonn · Since Tuesday evening, card payments in the retail sector have been problematic throughout Germany. The extent of the disruption remains unclear. In general, more and more people are paying by card. Cash sales in the retail sector have declined by eight points since 2019.
The extent of the disruption at certain payment terminals is still unclear. For example, retailers Aldi-Nord, Netto and Edeka confirmed on Friday afternoon that the problem with payments by giro or credit card, which was triggered by a software error on Tuesday, was still ongoing. However, the Edeka press office Rhine-Ruhr announced that stores in North Rhine-Westphalia and the neighbouring Rhineland-Palatinate and Lower Saxony are not affected.
But according to the head of the consumer advice centre in North Rhine-Westphalia, Wolfgang Schuldzinski, there were still consequences for consumers: "It is difficult enough for consumers when they suddenly can no longer pay for their purchases by card, because not everyone always has enough cash on them. But in addition, the systems are also often used to withdraw cash because of the decreasing number of bank branches. This can put people in dire straits,” he said.
Bitkom: Digital payment in Germany "secure and smooth"
On the whole, customers are paying by card more and more. This is, of course, partly because of the Coronavirus pandemic. According to the Federal Association of German Banks (bdb), the share of sales in stationary trade that was processed by card increased from 50.5 to 58.8 per cent from 2019 to 2021. The development in the total amount of payment transactions was similar. Last year, 37.9 per cent were paid by card, up from 26.1 per cent three years ago.
As for cash, in 2019 consumers still reached for notes and coins for about 14.6 billion purchases, according to the banking association. In the first Coronavirus year of 2020, this went down to about 12.1 billion purchases and a year later it was only approximately 10.1 billion, the organisation reports. Cash sales declined from 46.5 to 38.5 per cent during this period, according to bdb data.
In principle, digital payment in Germany works "securely and smoothly", said Kevin Hackl, Head of Digital Banking & Financial Services at the digital association Bitkom. For customers, it is more of a problem that they cannot yet pay digitally everywhere. "If, as in the current case, problems occur with the hardware - i.e. the card-reading terminals - or with the software, then it’s naturally annoying for the individual, but there is no reason to panic," Hackl said.
The Federal Office for Information Security does not suspect a cyber attack
These are isolated incidents that do not affect payment transactions in their entirety and will not reverse the trend that more and more citizens are turning to digital payment. Hackl cited a Bitkom survey, according to which two thirds of those surveyed are bothered if they cannot make cashless payments in shops with a card or smartphone.
He was certain that technical glitches in payment systems could often be remedied by software updates. How long these would take exactly could not be answered in general, and depended strongly on the concrete cause of the problem.
The Federal Office for Information Security (BSI) does not believe that the terminals could have been brought to their knees by a cyber-attack. At any rate, there are "no indications of this at present", a spokesperson said.
Originaltext: Bernd Eyermann and Ulla Thiede
Translation: Jean Lennox
