In a time of extreme economic sensitivity I was surprised to read details of a Simon-Kucher research exercise which concluded that the average price consumer are willing to pay to load a prepaid NFC e-Wallet is around £3 and that 65% of the public are eagerly
awaiting this. Now I am not normally one to criticise research exercises but I am fairly confident that either the research was conducted in a fairly affluent area or the interviewees didn't understand the concept that they would be charged £3 every time
they wanted to load their payment instrument (which - if we consider normal prepaid loads are fairly low ticket values is quite a significant charge indeed, in proportion).
It will be interesting to see how these schemes transpire in the UK - I am eagerly awaiting O2's new offering which, if the marketing emails are anything to go by, should be announced in November this year.
Will Apples announcements tomorrow have any impact to this - tune in tomorrow to find out?
The Simon-Kucher research is detailed in this article on The Register http://www.theregister.co.uk/2011/10/03/nfc_payments_survey/