takepayments blog.

Card payments are on the up and cash payments are slowing down. In fact, it’s predicted that by 2028, cash will make up as little as 9% of all payments - compared to the 60% it accounted for 20 years ago. So, what does that mean for your hairdressing business? It means you’ve got to move with the times if you want to keep your customers in your chair over your competitors.

In today's landscape, which values convenience, accepting card payments has become a necessity for businesses. In fact, the shift towards card payments has been huge, with UK Finance's Payment Markets Report for 2021 revealing that debit and credit card transactions accounted for 48% of all payments in the UK, surpassing cash payments by a significant margin (15%).

As a small business, upgrading or expanding your payment options is a no-brainer. Giving your customers more ways to pay not only makes your business more accessible, but offering multiple ways to pay can increase revenue by nearly 30%. We all know what the benefits of card are, so let’s look at another payment method that’s been taking the world by storm: Buy Now, Pay Later (BNPL).

We’re all familiar with the old-school tills of yesteryear: that memorable ‘ding’ when the cash register opened, the shop assistant manually inputting the price of each item sold, and some of you might even remember a time when tills were cash only. Flash forward to the present day and such a system can seem pretty prehistoric thanks to the introduction of point-of-sale (POS) till systems. And now, electronic point of sale (EPOS) systems have revolutionised payments further, making them quicker, simpler, and safer than ever before.