25 February 2019
For person-to person, P2P, payments, mobile payment is the method that involve the lowest social costs. One of the reasons is that mobile payments have become very popular for settling P2P accounts.
That is the conclusion in new analyses based on the Danish Payments Council's survey of costs of payments in Denmark. The analyses are part of a series providing insight into the social costs of various methods of payment.
"There is reason to believe that the new, more convenient P2P payment methods will increase the number of payments. The launch of mobile payments in recent years has brought about a change in P2P payments. New payment methods have been introduced, and the choice of solutions may be even wider in the future," says governor Per Callesen, Danmarks Nationalbank.
The Danish Payments Council has also surveyed the social costs of business-to-business, B2B, payments. They amounted to kr. 4.2 billion in 2016. At a price of 0.03 øre per krone spent, a credit transfer between businesses was the most inexpensive solution. Inpayment forms and Direct debits were slightly more expensive.
The analyses focuses on the social costs of payments. Social costs comprise the aggregate use of resources by the parties involved in a payment transaction. For private individuals, it is the value of the time spent making payments, which could have been used for other purposes, such as work. Social costs do not comprise the parties' transfers to each other, so e.g. the fees payable by businesses to card acquirers for receiving card payments are not included.
The Danish Payments Council was established by Danmarks Nationalbank in 2012 as a forum for collaboration on retail payments in Denmark. The series of analyses of the costs of payments can be found on Danmarks Nationalbank's webpage.
Enquiries can be directed to press advicer Ole Mikkelsen on tel. +45 3363 6027.