KUALA LUMPUR, Sept 29 — The popularity of online shopping among Malaysians has increased by nine per cent compared to last year, with 76 per cent of Malaysians indicating they shopped online at least once a month.
“This trend is even higher among millennials, with 82 per cent of them shopping online at least once a month,” according to the Visa Consumer Payment Attitudes survey.
The survey also showed that the top categories for purchases online were bill payments (58 per cent), fashion and accessories (52 per cent) and travel (52 per cent).
This was similar to the data from VisaNet, where top categories of spending by Malaysians included travel, insurance payments and telecommunications payments, it said.
In a statement today, Visa Country Manager for Malaysia, KB Ng, said the popularity in online shopping among Malaysians definitely has grown, where over 20 per cent growth in spending on e-Commerce was recorded.
“There is an increasing trend of more Malaysians using their mobile devices to shop online. The study showed that 57 per cent of Malaysians used their mobile phones to shop at least once a month online,” Ng said.
Shopping online has also evolved with the introduction of on-demand service providers such as Uber, Grab and Food Panda, Ng said.
Ng said 54 per cent of Malaysians had used these services in the past year and convenience was the main reason cited for using such services, followed by being able to shop in the comfort of their own homes.
This invisible payment experience has transformed the cardholders’ experience because they don’t have to whip out their payment cards or cash to pay for a product or service purchased because the cardholders’ card details were stored using card-on-file solutions, Ng said.
“We believe the consumers’ payments experience will continue to evolve for the better as we see more payment providers striving to enhance the payment experience for Malaysians,” Ng said.
Meanwhile, Ng said, on-demand services had also elevated consumers’ expectations as they expected faster delivery times.
Ng said 52 per cent of Malaysians used meal delivery on-demand services at least once a month and 53 per cent expected their meal orders to reach them within 30 minutes.
On the future modes of payment, Ng said, 57 per cent of consumers who wanted to pay for meal delivery via on-demand services indicated they would like to pay through mobile wallets, 47 per cent using wearables, 36 per cent of them using a pre-registered payment card and 17 per cent through Whatsapp. — Bernama
