More Consumers Use Card Sites to Pay Bills, Manage Accounts

Consumers' willingness to pay credit card bills online is rising rapidly, with 524 million transactions in 2006, a 27% jump over 414 million payments in 2005, according to survey data from comScore Inc. The most recent online payment volume, which represents payments consumers make at card issuers' Web sites, is up fully 73% over 302 million in 2004, says Reston, Va.-based comScore, which tracks consumer usage of online applications. According to the survey, which tracked cardholder usage at sites maintained by American Express Co., Bank of America Corp., Capital One Financial Corp., JPMorgan Chase & Co., Citigroup Inc., and Discover Financial Services Inc., along with others, 63% of consumers say the ability to manage their accounts online is important to them. Of these, 77% say being able to pay their bills is important, second only to viewing statements (83%) and ahead of disputing a transaction (62%). Overall, some 69% of consumers have used an issuer's Web site at one time or another, with 58% of these reporting they log in more than once a month. Indeed, the comScore data reveal cardholders are using issuer sites more than ever, with 3.62 billion total visits last year, up 57% over 2005 and more than double the number in 2004. In the first quarter of 2007, the volume of visits topped 1 billion, a 32% leap over the same period in 2006, the company says. In a result that should prove encouraging for issuers looking to cut costs, some 62% of cardholders say they are either already receiving paperless statements or are willing to. “Issuers can expect paperless adoption to grow,” comScore says in a statement, pointing to the youth market in particular. Consumers age 18 to 44 are 20% more likely to receive paperless statements than older cardholders. Overall, 58% said they'd adopt paperless statements if given a cash incentive. The comScore results rely in part on a proprietary panel of more than 1 million Web users in the U.S., supplemented by a survey of 1,974 U.S. online consumers conducted in the second quarter.