What Happened When I Forgot My Wallet

An Oversight

Busy to the point of distraction. If you're at all like I am, you've been there. We all have days where the inputs and outputs of the day may get slightly out of balance...

I had such a morning a few weeks back.

The pace of my work and burning the midnight oil during the prior evening had coalesced to make me more than slightly absent-minded. I left my physical wallet at home as a result. I realized that I had forgotten my physical wallet after I was already a mile from my home and close to my destination in uptown Charlotte.

Instead of employing a choice expletive and performing a risky u-turn in the busy traffic, I took a moment of mindfulness, drew in a deep breath and then exhaled slowly. I thought through my options with detachment and clarity. It occurred to me that one option was to proceed through my day without a physical wallet and see how things would go with just my smartphone. After all, my career has been dedicated, in part, to enabling financial services to evolve away from the old order (wallets) and into the emerging realities of fintech.

"Keep driving. Let's see how today goes without your physical wallet," I thought.

And so started an interesting experiment in how far mobile payments have evolved.

What Happened Next

I Parked

I arrived at a parking lot in uptown Charlotte. I pulled into my space and opened the ParkMobile app on my smartphone. I was able to pay for the parking space while sitting in my car. It was easy and straight-forward on a couple of levels, as it integrated with one of the more common online payment facilitators.

First hurdle - cleared!

Quick, easy, effective.

I Caffeinated

I got to the Not Just Coffee that is attached to Packard Place, where my co-working facility is located. They have a Stripe terminal as their 'register.' I asked if I could do Apple Pay. My friend 'L' said that they only support Samsung Pay, which she explained, "Worked pretty well the few times that people have tried it."

I told L that Samsung Pay mimics the magnetic strip of a physical card and that it is a very important innovation.

L told me that was pretty interesting, then smiled as she asked if I had forgotten my wallet.

"Yes, it has been that kind of morning," I said, smiling back at her.

She laughed and told me that I could come back tomorrow to pay for my coffee and then gave me a mug of their delightful brew. So... this particular section is less of a testimonial about mobile payments and more about how fantastic the people are at NJC.

I Ate

As the day progressed, I needed a quick bite to eat. Having had a big breakfast, I wasn't terribly hungry, but I needed a little something. I went into the Walgreens in the Overstreet Mall in uptown Charlotte where I purchased a banana and a bottle of mineral water by using Apple Pay.

The cashier greeted me warmly as I walked up and wished me a good day as I departed, but she had no role in the transaction. I walked away thinking about how automation would impact jobs like the one that she was doing.

Quick, easy, effective.

I Snacked

There is a vending machine inside of Packard Place that serves healthy snack food. Clif Bars, Boom Chicka Pop popcorn, natural fig bars - that sort of thing. Later in the day, I grabbed a Clif Bar from the vending machine by using Apple Pay through a payment terminal attached to the vending machine itself.

Once again - quick, easy, effective.

I Bought

Toward the end of the day, I realized that I needed to stop by the grocery store near my home to get a few items. I had started ordering many of my groceries online in late 2016, so I fired up the Harris Teeter app and selected what I needed. Once again, I encountered Apple Pay. I chose it as my payment method during the check-out step, using my thumbprint to do a biometric validation. I scheduled the pick-up for 9:30 pm that night.

Yet again - quick, easy, effective.

In Summary...

It is feasible to have a reasonably normal day without the small pieces of plastic or green pieces of paper through which we have traditionally managed our financial lives. On the day where I tested how far I could go without cards or cash, I met nearly all of my imperatives without a hitch by leveraging fintech solutions. Such a day wasn't even remotely in the cards (pun?) only a couple of years ago.

And we can count on the fact that things will be very, very different only a few years into the future. Mobile payments are evolving very quickly - and that evolution is happening right now.

During the day that this experiment took place, I was pretty sure that it would have been nearly impossible to sit down to a meal at a restaurant in uptown Charlotte and pay from my smartphone... but now I am not so sure about that. It's possible that at least a few of the forward-thinking restaurants have started to turn the corner on mobile payments. I'll be watching and asking.

In closing, as technology providers like Apple, Samsung, Google and others continue to compete to be the mobile payments provider-of-choice, may we the consumers be the beneficiaries - by living a financial life that is quick, easy and effective.

May the race go to the swiftest, as always!

@TriquetraIT on Twitter