UK Finance responds to HMT announcement on increasing contactless payment limit to £100

Responding to the Chancellor's announcement that the legal contactless payment limit will increase to £100, chief executive of UK Finance David Postings said:

UK Finance welcomes the flexibility to increase the contactless limit to £100. This is a great move for customers and will allow them to use contactless to pay for higher value transactions like their weekly shop or filling up their car with fuel.

"This could not have been achieved whilst still in the EU so is a true Brexit dividend. We will work closely with the payments sector and retailers ahead of increasing the limit later this year.

Area of expertise:

Cards Payments, innovation & resilience

Notes to editor

UK Finance?s latest card spending data, including contactless card spending, is available here. This found the total value of contactless transactions was 43.7 per cent higher in November 2020 than the previous year.
UK Finance manages the process for setting the industry contactless limit. HM Treasury and the FCA?s announcement gives the industry the flexibility to increase this limit to up to £100 for a single contactless payment.
Every now and then, customers making contactless transactions will be asked to enter their PIN to check it?s really them. Currently, customers are required to enter their PIN if the total value of consecutive contactless transactions exceeds £130. UK Finance welcomes the move to increase this to a maximum of £300.
The industry continues to deploy a range of fraud prevention and detection tools to protect consumers. These tools remain highly effective in the fight against fraud. UK Finance?s Half Year Fraud update has found contactless fraud rates remain low, with losses falling by 20 per cent to £8.2 million in the first half of 2020. This is equivalent to 2.0p in every £100 spent using contactless technology, a decrease from 2.7p reported in 2019.
Contactless is one of a range of payment methods and the industry will continue to work closely with HM Treasury and regulators to ensure that customers can pay in a way that suits them, including by ensuring access to cash remains free and widely accessible for those that continue to need it.

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Cards Payments