When Bizum, the payment service provider in Spain through the mobile environment, was founded in June 2016, a seed was planted that has germinated spectacularly. This mobile payment solution, the result of the collaboration of the vast majority of Spanish banks, if in 2019 it exceeded 6 million users, in 2020 it reached 10 million.
But its rise did not stop there, and in the first half of 2021 Bizum has already far exceeded the objectives met for its entire last fiscal year.
With only four years after its appearance on the financial scene, Bizum achieved more than 16.5 million users, for whom it managed approximately 495 million transactions with an associated volume of €24.6 billion. This figure is equivalent to an average value per transaction of 49.69 euros, which is more than enough for Bizum to have earned a well-deserved space of its own in the Spanish market.
A year of record growth
If 2020 was already fruitful for Bizum, achieving outstanding figures during the first half of the year, in 2021 it has already managed to exceed the objectives set for the whole year. The main objective for 2021 was to increase the figure of 8,000 merchants that in 2020 had been integrated into this payment solution. Well, this number of affiliated merchants, in the first half of 2021 has already reached 18,250, far exceeding expectations.
At the same time, Bizum has made it easier to generalize its use. For example, Bizumers can pay their lottery bets and collect their prizes at all Loterías y Apuestas del Estado points of sale. The new service launched by Bizum in December 2020, has already accumulated 40,000 transactions with an associated volume of €1.8 million.
These data indicate that during the first half of 2021, the payment platform recorded around 1.6 million online purchases, against 850,000 in 2020. And as the number of merchants affiliated to Bizum increased, so did the volume associated with the purchases, reaching 97 million euros in the first half of 2021 alone.
The social aspect of Bizum: solidarity
Being such an efficient and easy-to-use platform via cell phone, Bizum represents an ideal means of making donations or solidarity contributions. In the pandemic 2020, the payment platform channeled more than 74,000 donations to different NGOs, reaching a figure that exceeded 2.5 million euros. Now Bizum has more than 4,050 NGOs to which donations can be made, and the number of solidarity organizations that are added continues to grow.
This leads to a growth in donations made, which in the first half of 2021 reached 98,000, totaling an approximate amount collected of 3.6 million euros.
Digital innovation in Spanish banking
The advantages offered by Bizum to the user are clear and unquestionable:
Total availability: the function is present on any smartphone without having to change banks, as it is interconnected with the vast majority.
- Convenience: it is not necessary to know the recipient’s account number. It is enough to include their cell phone number (or select their contact in your phone’s address book) to be able to make a payment into their account immediately.
- Speed: in less than 5 seconds the money is in the recipient’s account.
- Security: the Bizum user has the support of Spanish banks, using their applications and security measures without the need to provide additional data.
There is no doubt that Bizum is positioned as one of the joint projects that are part of the digital innovation of Spanish banking.
At Somos Sinapsis, passionate about digitalization in all sectors, we are strongly committed to this new payment service with which banks expand their range of services.