How Payment Friction Puts a Damper on Travel As Summer Sets in

The summer travel season has arrived, promising big volume uplifts for payments processors. But wonky payments, checkout letdowns, and fraud fears could lead to less volume than travel companies expect, according to a pair of travel reports released Tuesday.

So far, demand looks strong. Some 91% of consumers are planning or at least checking out a trip for this summer, according to “The Experience Economy Report 2026—Summer Travel” report from the big payments processor Paysafe. The report surveyed 4,500 consumers in seven countries, including the United States.

And a similar report from anti-fraud platform Riskfied finds “strong demand for travel heading into the summer season.” Riskfied’s report relies on responses from 4,060 consumers, also in seven countries including the U.S., but not the same nations in all cases as those Paysafe surveyed.

Putting a damper on travel plans, according to Riskified, are payment security (cited by 47% of respondents) and fears about fake or invalid tickets (39%). As for using an AI bot to find and possibly pay for a trip, confidence is in short supply. A slim 17% would trust a bot to handle functions like passport details or, among the more adventurous travelers, payments, without human supervision.

Paysafe’s report similarly calls payment friction “a significant barrier” in travel planning. Some 44% of travelers in its study cited payment problems while traveling, while 45% walked away when such trouble cropped up.

All in all, travelers are short of patience when payment must be rendered, holding to much the same standards they expect to see at home. They are “expecting payments to be fast, seamless, and reliable wherever they are,” notes Bob Legters, chief product officer at Paysafe, in a statement. The company’s research indicates 70% of travelers go on the road expecting to use several payment methods to make sure transactions will go through.

But before any traveler goes anywhere, it turns out “booking experiences remain uneven,” according to Riskified. Here, just one-third of those surveyed were able to report a smooth experience. They cited problems at checkout that included declines and troublesome steps involved in identity verification. In some cases, identity verification led more than half of respondents to abandon a booking.

There may be no cure for all ills in travel, but one thing stands out as a strong remedy: the right price. Riskified’s report indicates 63% of respondents cited “big discounts” as a motivator to go through with a transaction even in the face of a gnarly experience.

Riskified’s research covered consumers in the United States, United Kingdom, China, Japan, Mexico, Brazil, and Colombia. The Paysafe study encompassed the United States, United Kingdom, Canada, Germany, Italy, Portugal, and Spain.