About a third (34%) of Europeans, on average, would go completely cashless if they had the choice, the share going up to 42% in Turkey, 41% in Italy, 40% in Poland, and 38% in Romania, according to the ING International Survey – Cashless Society.

The study was conducted between February 7 and February 27, 2017, on some 15,000 adults over 18 from 15 countries (13 European countries plus US and Australia).

About one in five (21%) of respondents across 13 European countries said they rarely carry cash, with the highest shares being registered in France (35%), Poland (33%), and Netherlands and Belgium (30% each). In Romania, only 14% of respondents said they rarely carry cash, with only Spain (13%) and Germany (10%) having lower shares.

“Today’s alternatives go well beyond cheques, from credit and debit cards to mobile wallets and other e-payments technologies, including mobile apps on a tablet, smartphone or wearable device,” reads the study.

At European level, the study shows a steady decline in the habit of using cash, with more than half (54%) of European respondents saying that they used less cash in the past 12 months, and 78% predicting a further decrease in the following year.

About half of respondents in Europe said that they would feel comfortable and could manage for at least a week without physical cash, while 29% even said they could last “forever” without it. In Romania, more than half (52%) of respondents said that they could be comfortable “forever” without cash – the survey high.

Meanwhile, 55% of people in Europe said they believe there is a “high” or “very high” level of security when paying without cash, with only 11% believing security is “low” or “very low”. However, nearly a third (32%) across Europe are ambivalent about the security on offer – saying that security when paying without cash is “neither low nor high”. In Romania, 57% of respondents said that they feel safe when paying without cash.

However, the study also shows that around three-quarters of Europeans (76%) believe that they will never go completely cashless. The lowest share is in the Netherlands (59%), followed closely by Belgium (62%) and France (62%), while the share in Romania stays at 74%.

The entire study can be found here.

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Irina Popescu, irina.popescu@romania-insider.com