Romania’s Bank Card Online Payments Up 75% In ’09, To EUR92.8M

RomCard is one of Romania’s bank card processing centers and has 150 active companies certified in the 3D Secure system.

„Electronic commerce is a domain less affected by the economic crisis and its growth potential will also continue next year. The economic crisis determined companies to choose more efficient solutions, with results they could easily measure, and requiring lower costs, and so many of these companies shifted to the online market,” Gecad ePayment executive manager Carmen Sebe said in a press release.

The number of online transactions in 2009 was of over 1.24 million, double compared to 2008. In the ePayment system, 1.1 million transactions were operated, which means online payments stood at EUR88 million.

In 2009, the average value of an online transaction was of EUR79, similar to that registered in 2007, and slightly decreasing compared to 2008 when the average value of an online transaction was of EUR85.

Most online transactions were registered in the fourth quarter of 2009 when over 100,000 transactions were processed monthly, while the biggest online transaction value was reported in the third quarter of 2009.

The products purchased online maintain the last two years’ trend. Thus, the telecom sector accounted for 45% of the total number of transactions in the ePayment system, followed by tourism (38%), services (10%) and eTail (7%).

ePayment estimates the online card transaction market will increase by 30% in 2010, and Romcard estimates that their value might reach EUR120/130 million by the end of the year.

In 2008, bank card online payments increased by 53% compared to 2007, to EUR53.1 million and 652,000 transactions.