LAS VEGAS—From trends credit unions should be following, to better use of data for personalization, to the growing importance of digital issuance, a panel of experts at Edge 2025 addressed the future of payments.
Moderated by Filene Research Institute CEO Mark Meyer, the panel first discussed trends credit unions should be following. Edge 2025 is presented by Trellance, CUDX and the Filene Research Institute.
Mischa Lumiere, VP,head of NA product experience design and digital at Visa, pointed to two payment trends credit unions should be following.
“One is the rapid adoption of mobile wallets. Within the last 90 days, 60% of payments are actually coming through on mobile wallets—which is such a shift over what we have seen in the last several years,” Lumerie said.
Why that matters, explained Lumerie, is that everyone should be thinking about how to stay on top of mobile wallets and mobile wallet experiences.
“Because once you set that digital wallet experience with your members, there is inertia there. It’s hard for them to shift away,” she said.
Lumerie also encouraged credit unions to pay much closer to buy now, pay later.
“I believe a number of us in the industry probably thought it was a fleeting trend, that BNPL was not going to stick around,” she said. “But, as we know, the adoption of BNPL is gaining traction, particularly among younger consumers. Whereas you may have thought that it was not so healthy credit, we're not seeing the default rates that we expected. I think it's here to stay.”
Rob Goodwin, VP of network growth at Velera, pointed out 50% to 60% of consumers who bought Coachella tickets this year used BNPL.
“It's just become a different way to pay. It's also a way for credit union issuers to get disintermediated, or supplanted,” Goodwin said. “For credit unions it’s really important to look out for those blind spots, where there's different disintermediation opportunities for those other players to take some of that relationship away.”
Faster Payments
Turning to the importance of speedy payments, Lumerie emphasized the growing importance of real-time payments.
“No one wants to send a check anymore. They want to do things immediately with peer-to-peer payments,” she said. “The expectation is that everyone's offering it. And, yes, Zelle has been in the news a lot because of scams. But everyone wants to be able to send and receive their money really quickly. But that's on the consumer side. In the small business world it's even more important as small business owners are trying to stay ahead of their cash flow and pay their suppliers as quickly as possible. It can be the difference between staying in business and ending up having to close your shop.”
Christine Kimbell, EVP at Filene, stressed real-time payments add value to a relationship and they improve people’s lives.
“This idea that I get a big check and then it has to sit there sometimes for 10 days…That is money that usually comes in for something they need, like a house payment,” Kimbell said. “The ability to take away the friction and make that possible—to get people their money quickly—is growing in importance. When you think about the business we're in and how do we actually improve members’ lives, providing access to money quickly is critical.
Mark Crager, chief revenue officer for Flow Networks encouraged credit unions to engage with their payments data so they can provide a “curated” experience for members, delivering additional products and services carefully crafted to meet their members’ needs based on their histories.
Lumerie agreed, reminding that AI can greatly help with personalization.
“What we've seen in the last couple of years with generative AI, and now agentic AI, many things are becoming more much more possible,” she said. “I'm not suggesting that all of you go out and build your own models, but there's so many different players you can partner with and find ways in which to leverage this amazing technology to personalize your products and services so that they truly matter to your members.”
Meyer addressed the growing importance of digital card issuance. He described a recent visit to a restaurant where he left his debit card behind in the payment folio.
“I called my credit union and they told me they would mail me my new card in seven to ten days,” he said, adding that type of slow response is not acceptable to consumers and opens the door for them to choose another card.
Lumerie concurred.
“In that seven to ten days you’ll probably lose your top-wallet status,” she said.