How to ensure smooth payments that keep customers coming back

Imagine you’re in a café. You’ve found a table, ordered lunch and enjoyed catching up with friends. The bill comes, and everyone reaches for their debit cards. You notice a label on the payment device that says, ‘We are cash-free’. You wonder when the last time was that you even used cash.

This scenario is becoming more and more common. UK Finance found that 87% of people in the UK make a contactless payment at least once a month. In 2023, 38% of all payments in the UK were made via contactless methods, and 51% were made via debit cards.

But with the shift to a cashless and contactless society comes challenges that retailers and ecommerce brands must address. Payments need to be fast, flexible, and secure to ensure customer satisfaction and support the brand’s ability to scale and adapt.

“It’s vital that businesses take every step possible to make the payment process simple and user-friendly. Happy customers come from having processes that make it easy for them to complete the entire buying process whenever they visit – be this online, via mobile or in-person,” says Laurence Booth, group CEO of Trust Payments. 

Customer satisfaction

Consumers expect speed, simplicity and seamlessness when it comes to payments. Minimising friction in the payment process is essential to avoid cart abandonment and keep people coming back. According to 2024 data from PYMNTS Intelligence, 77% of customers would abandon their cart if their preferred payment method was unavailable at checkout. 

Minimising friction means having a simple checkout process both online and in-person, removing unnecessary fields and offering guest checkout options to avoid forcing account creation. Even seemingly small details, such as clear instructions and imagery, can contribute significantly to a positive user experience and higher conversion rates. 

Trust Payments, a payment solutions provider, highlights several things merchants should have in place to ensure their payment solutions are effective. The checklist includes accepting mobile and virtual wallets, offering local payment methods and considering flexible payment options such as ‘buy now, pay later.’ 

Booth says: “When a customer can complete a transaction with ease, satisfaction is high, and repeat business is more likely. This makes it critical to focus on delivering fast, secure and reliable payment experiences for every step of a customer journey.”

In a study with Prospectus Global, Trust Payments found that consumers rated ‘slow payment experiences’ (25%) as the top pain point in the payment process. But ‘digital wallets not working’ and ‘authentication being too cumbersome’ also made this list. This points to a growing desire for payment integrations like Apple Pay or Google Wallet on merchant websites. Not only does the use of integrations with digital wallets provide a speedier route to completing a payment, but it also fosters a sense of credibility and trust, which helps to build more security into payments overall.

It can be as simple as transparent communication. The Government’s gov.uk payment portal has evolved over the years to ensure it meets the needs of the British public. Government research found an increase in satisfaction from 72% in 2022 to 75% in 2023, largely due to prompt email communication informing users of the transaction’s completion.

Trust Payments also found that improving communication with customers was a simple way merchants could boost conversion rates. Part of that can be around returns and delivery. If information about logistics is easy to find or baked into the payment process, customers will feel confident that their purchase is safe. This can contribute to better customer satisfaction.

There are big benefits for merchants too. Seamless payments can support business growth, while payment problems can cause headaches. According to 2024 data from PYMNTS Intelligence, 11% of transactions processed by the average ecommerce firm had failed in the past year, with 80% of firms citing difficulty in pinpointing the causes of failed payments as a major challenge. 

Trust Payments’ embedded payments service is making payments a clear and frictionless experience for merchants. Booth says the company’s solutions “help businesses grow and scale online, in-store and on mobile.” The solutions provider helps firms handle all their business transactional needs through offerings including point of sales (POS) terminals, open banking accounts, loyalty management and instant ecommerce – all backed with 24/7 customer service.

Case study: Guestline 

Guestline is a software company serving the hospitality industry. It provides till systems to hotels that encompass everything from check-in payments to stocktaking. It saw growth potential in expanding its property management system’s functionality.

In an industry with a complex compliance landscape, Guestline required careful attention to payment processing. However, with Trust Payments offering its own acquiring service, Guestline was able to build efficiency and security into its payment process. 

Guestline wanted to ensure that the shift to Trust Payments would not jeopardise the close, direct relationships it has with its hotel partners. Thanks to Trust Payments’ flexibility and customer care, Guestline was able to maintain its role as the primary customer service partner for payments.

Trust Payments helped Guestline through this process by running an intensive training course to build in the in-house capacity for payments solution customer service management. Ongoing access to Trust Payments’ reporting allows Guestline visibility across all its hoteliers. 

When Covid-19 affected restaurant service options, Guestline was able to offer email payment links to diners at its hotels. And, instead of spending extra on acquiring services with banks, it could retain more revenue as a result.

“We had a strong relationship as a partner for many years and I personally presented the Trust Payments’ ISO proposition to our investors for their approval in 2019. They were bowled over by it. We are delighted to still be working together as we expand Guestline into new international markets,” said Andrew Williams, product strategy director at Guestline.

Safe and secure

Another key factor in building trust and ensuring smooth payments is security. Implementing features such as tokenisation, fraud detection and encryption protects sensitive data and minimises risk. 

With cybercrime top of mind for consumers, merchants recognise the growing importance of addressing these concerns before a purchase is completed

“Security is a pressing concern for customers,” says Booth. Trust Payments worked with YouGov on a report that found 93% of Brits received a scam text or email in 2022, with half reporting weekly scams (51%) and 78% reporting receiving at least one scam attempt a month.

“It is therefore important that businesses include robust verification and authentication protocols into their checkout processes. This includes collaborating with banks to flag suspicious transactions before validation and ensuring additional approval for virtual purchases, where fraud risk is higher. With cybercrime top of mind for consumers, merchants recognise the growing importance of addressing these concerns before a purchase is completed,” says Booth. 

Trust Payments prioritises the use of tokenisation, encryption, 3D secure and fraud detection methods to ensure payments are protected and safe. Security is vital to customer retention, business growth and a positive reputation as a merchant. 

“In a mobile-first world, payments must be clear, simple and fast. The era of scanning cards and dealing with complicated receipts has been replaced by a demand for quick checkouts and mobile wallet compatibility. It’s important for a customer to be able to make a transaction as quickly as possible but still feel confident of fraud protection with the latest authentication and verification tools,” Booth says. 

Security changes are coming to the payments landscape. The European Commission is considering two proposals – the Third Payment Services Directive (PSD3) and the Payment Services Regulation – to improve consumer protections and empowerment around open banking. PSD3 was driven largely by the rapid change to the payments landscape that happened during Covid-19. Businesses had to change their process and identify new opportunities for continuing to trade during the pandemic period. Thus, the payments landscape had to evolve with the commercial landscape. 

PSD3 will, according to J.P. Morgan, “level the playing field between banks and non-bank PSPs by minimising the risk of regulatory arbitrage,” while also increasing consumer protection. 

There is no doubt that the payments landscape will continue to change as a result of PSD3, consumer needs and shifts in commercial activity. But, with a payments provider that delivers safe, fast, seamless payments, any business will be able to create the foundation it needs to boost customer satisfaction and support growth and opportunity. 

For more information, visit trustpayments.com

Imagine you’re in a café. You’ve found a table, ordered lunch and enjoyed catching up with friends. The bill comes, and everyone reaches for their debit cards. You notice a label on the payment device that says, ‘We are cash-free’. You wonder when the last time was that you even used cash.

This scenario is becoming more and more common. UK Finance found that 87% of people in the UK make a contactless payment at least once a month. In 2023, 38% of all payments in the UK were made via contactless methods, and 51% were made via debit cards.

But with the shift to a cashless and contactless society comes challenges that retailers and ecommerce brands must address. Payments need to be fast, flexible, and secure to ensure customer satisfaction and support the brand's ability to scale and adapt.