RBA September reports higher credit card usage

RBA September reports higher credit card usage

24 November 2009

The Australian credit cards industry has reported an increase in consumer usage and spending habits for the month of September with repayments amounts and frequency also rising.

According to the Reserve Bank of Australia, September 2009 saw the credit cards industry recover more activity levels with Australians using their credit cards, debit cards and charge cards at a higher frequency then previous months. Interestingly EFTPOS usage has actually declined in its usage levels, although it would appear that spending habits are at a more cautious rate then before the Global Financial Crisis.

The month of September saw a rise of two per cent in the overall credit cards market with the value of credit and charge card transactions equalling to $19.2 billion, which is up from $18.8 billion in August.

Within this market, the RBA posted September figures showing that the actual financial amount attached to the rise in spending had also increased 1.9 per cent from $17.9 billion in August to $18.2 billion in September.

The actual number of charges when it came to credit and charge accounts numbers were fairly steady with 14.35 million purchases using credit cards.

When considering business credit, this dropped for the second consecutive month, down 1.3 per cent over September 2009, with a decline of 0.7 per cent over August. Overall for the twelve months that lead to September the amount of business credit declined by 4.6 per cent.

Credit Cards Repayments

The actual amount that was repaid by Australians on their credit cards increased by 3.5 per cent to $19.6 billion which left the total amount owed on personal credit cards and charge cards to $45.1 billion for the month of September. The twelve months leading to September 2009 saw total repayments for credit cards drop by 0.3 per cent.

Actual balances accruing interest for credit cards fell from $32.48 billion in August 2009 to $32.43 billion in September 2009.

EFTPOS

The frequency of EFTPOS purchases declined by approximately two per cent to $11.65 billion, down from $11.88 billion in August. However, the monetary value attached to these EFTPOS purchases rose 12.1 per cent from September 2008.

Cash Advances

When it comes to cash advances and the actual amount charged was marked at $2.44 million, an increase of 4.1 per cent with the cash amount or value of these advances increased by 0.7 per cent.

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