UK’s Gen Y prepared to stump up $8/month for mobile banking

The tech-savvy Gen Y demographic (18-26 year olds) will shape banking in the years to come. They demand on-the-go, personalized communications and seek to use a variety of channels, including mobile.

Banks love mobile banking, too. Moving consumers to mobile banking cuts down on branch and call-center costs hence why mobile banking is currently offered for free.

So the results of Simon-Kucher & Partners’ consumer discovery panel study, which found over three-quarters (76%) of the Gen Y demographic in the UK would be willing to stump up a monthly fee for mobile banking, makes good reading for all concerned.

In the UK, Gen Y equates to 12% of the population, and the survey found they’re willing to pay a little over $8 a month for the convenience of mobile banking.

What do they want for that fee? The majority (81%) cite straightforward flat ‘informational services’ as the most important feature of mobile banking followed by transactional (69%) and interactive (53%) features. Respondents said flexibility, time savings and accessibility were the perceived main benefits of using mobile banking.

“Paid-for mobile banking can also play a long term strategic role in customer succession planning,” said Ben Snowman, senior consultant at Simon-Kucher & Partners and author of the study.

“If banks launch fee-carrying mobile services, consecutive generations of customers will move towards paid-for services and an increasingly lower portion of the customer base will use free banking.”