Greece Still Lags Behind EU Average in Online Payments

Despite the changing banking and purchasing landscape, Greeks are still not opting to make online transactions for their banking needs, a European Central Bank study reveals.

More specifically, according to 2018 data, despite increased credit card use due to the implementation of banking restrictions – in effect since June 2015, Greece is still last among 19 eurozone peers and 24th among 28 European countries in terms of online payments.

In the overall ranking, Italy is 25th, followed by Bulgaria, and Romania, while in the eurozone classification, Greece and Italy are followed by Cyprus, Malta and Spain as the poorest performers.

According to ECB 2018 data, Greeks made 1.2 trillion online transactions compared to 1 trillion in 2017, 795 billion in 2016, and 616.2 million in 2015. At the same time, 50 percent of all electronic payments were card transactions, at 631.1 billion in 2018 against 144.4 billion in 2015.

However, despite the increase in card payments, Greece is still lagging behind in all other electronic transactions. Indicatively, online payments via accounts increased from 243.4 billion euros in 2015 to 337.8 billion euros in 2018.