The latest comScore MobiLens research shows that 20 million mobile phone users across the UK, France, Spain, Germany and Italy accessed their bank accounts via their mobiles in March. Overall, that’s 8.5% of mobile phone users. In addition, 5.1% accessed credit cards and 5.2% accessed electronic payments via their mobile devices.
comScore started its mobile banking research in August last year, since when there’s been a 15.4% rise in m-banking usage. Smartphone users are responsible for much of this increase; the number of mobile banking smartphone users has risen by 40% since August 2010.
Jeremy Copp, vice president of mobile for comScore Europe, said “Consumers want to be able to access information on the go at any time, and with mobile banking becoming more user-friendly through apps and mobile optimized pages, people are gradually becoming accustomed to it. It will be important for service providers, such as banks and credit card providers, to watch this development as it can certainly be seen as an indicator of increased trust in mobile services.”
Mobile banking usage was highest in France, where 10.3% of consumers were m-banking users. Next was Spain, with 10.2%, followed by the UK with 8.6%.