Imagine using your credit card as a subway ticket, waving it at a movie poster to reserve seats or splitting the cost of dinner with friends electronically on the fly without the need for smartphones, apps or QR codes—and instantly completing the transaction in the blink of an eye. Tomorrow’s most popular credit cards will let you do all of that.
With credit card usage at an all-time high and 83% of millennials (the largest living adult generation) now possessing them, cards have all but replaced cash as the most common form of payment. They’re also undergoing a host of revolutionary and high-tech upgrades that will make them even more of an all-purpose financial solution in the years ahead.
Data Storage and Virtual IDs
As the cost and size of digital storage continues to shrink, credit cards are increasingly becoming capable of storing information. They may soon function as forms of virtual ID, akin to driver’s licenses, featuring built-in sensors that allow you to ditch physical items like access cards, keys and plastic fobs and access everything from our apartment doors to neighborhood gyms without cluttering up your pocket.
Among the over 7 billion devices connected and communicating online—known as the Internet of Things—linked up credit cards will also help providers offer more personalized payment and credit options, and enable companies to offer card owners more customized discounts, coupons and rewards. Picture cards that automatically apply 10% discounts across the board on your birthday will instantly beam you cash back when you meet a minimum monthly spending level or let you create your own frequent buyer rewards program with any store.
Wireless Capabilities
Forget standing in line at a ticket booth or grocery checkout line. You’ll soon be able to wirelessly pay for anything—even monthly bills such as rent—right from the palm of your hand. Without the need for additional apps or high-tech devices, credit cards will soon function as all-purpose portable digital wallets suitable for any type of payment. Capable of acting as two-way transfer devices, tomorrow’s cards will also enable cashless, peer-to-peer transactions, so you can transfer money easily among individuals when it’s time to settle up a drinking or dining tab.
Increased Security
Whether using sensors directly built into tomorrow’s cards or futuristic payment terminals housed at various retailers that are capable of matching your eyes or voice with your account, your personal information should be safer than ever. The world’s largest financial firms are already working to build fingerprinting, facial/voice recognition and other biometric technologies into cards to ensure everything’s legit.
Intelligent Spending and Budgeting
Advancements like artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning would allow credit cards to become smarter over time as they’re fed more purchase info—and they may also soon help you manage your monthly budget. Using such high-tech tools, you could easily monitor and manage everyday expenses to enjoy deeper insights into your spending habits in real-time, rather than retroactively—and set up automatic alert notifications or holds that take effect instantly if you’re spending when you should be saving instead. Likewise, these solutions can also be used to track everyday buying habits and scan for abnormal activity, and instantly lock down a potentially lost or stolen card, or remotely wipe payment data from it, in the event of possible ID theft.
Parental Controls
Families may further benefit from high-tech upgrades. Imagine parental control solutions that automatically transfer weekly allowance payments for children, track their buying patterns or restrict kids to making purchases only at approved retailers and up to set maximums.
A Lot More to Come
As payment technologies like blockchain solutions and cash-sharing apps continue to evolve, credit cards are rapidly transforming to keep up. But boarding buses and trains with the wave of your wrist is just the beginning. From fast food drive-thrus you can speed through without ever interacting with a human to convenience stores that let you grab any item and walk out without ever visiting a register, the sky’s the limit here.
Award-winning professional speaker Scott Steinberg is among today’s best-known trends experts and futurists, and the bestselling author of “Make Change Work for You: 10 Ways to Future-Proof Yourself, Fearlessly Innovate, and Succeed Despite Uncertainty” and “Millennial Marketing: Bridging the Generation Gap.”
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