The power of painless payment

I am one of those annoying, mildly claustrophobic people who sit at the end of a row in cinemas. There are plenty of things in life — films, plays, social events — which I can only fully enjoy knowing I can make a sharp exit at any time. It’s not that I leave: I just like to know I can. My idea of hell is a party on a boat.

So I am rather enamoured with the new mobile-phone app Qkr, which lets you pay with your phone in some restaurants without waiting for the bill. It’s the honest man’s version of ‘doing a runner’. You check in on your phone, give a four-digit code to the waiter or waitress, and then you are free to order extra items and settle up on your screen. This creates a perfect ‘third way’ between a restaurant and a fast-food outlet.

(The only slight downside of this technology is that my children ingeniously discovered that I now no longer need to be physically present in Wagamama to pay for their food. I recently paid for a mini chicken ramen in Sevenoaks from a hotel room in Athens, thereby fulfilling the teenager’s fantasy of the perfect dad — someone who pays for things while being as far away as possible.)

I have long believed that new payment technologies have much more effect on people’s economic behaviour than we expect. In many ways the credit card is the greatest consumerist mind-hack ever invented (if I had to pay for my holidays in cash, I would go to Pontins every year — in February). What you buy is surprisingly dependent on how you pay for it. So I duly predict that the new contactless payment cards will change behaviour more than we think.

Small transactions which are annoying as much for their hassle as for their expense (paying to use loos in stations, for instance) should be easier.