Maestro and giropay make progress in European e-commerce

 Credit card still remains the method of payment for more than 80% of all purchases. But in stead of this Maestro and giropay market shares have risen again. Now maestro takes the third place among the preferred online payment methods in Europe. Deutsche Card Services published the results of E-Commerce Report 2009 which says that Visa has increased its market share in European e-commerce at the expense of MasterCard. More than 70% of all online transactions are paid by Visa credit cards. Different payment methods in e-commerce are used by the men and the women. The difference is particularly striking for German consumers: While men use credit cards for more than 40% of their purchases, making it their preferred payment method, women continue to use the more traditional direct debit method.

This study on "Trends in E-Commerce Purchasing and Payment Behaviour" is based on a sample of roughly 30 million real-life purchase transactions processed via the platform of Deutsche Card Services when other researches are based on the analysis of polls and surveys. The purchases were made in all e-commerce-relevant sectors such as retail, services or travel & entertainment.