Stuart Gregory, VP eWallet at Skrill

We all want faster and easier ways to pay so digital wallets are the natural extension to our increasingly cashless lives.

Last week’s announcement that leading banks are adding Zapp, a mobile payment facility, to their smartphone and tablet apps is yet another sign of the growing demand from consumers for digital wallets.

In 2013, UK shoppers spent a massive £91 bn online – with twice as much spent on mobile devices in December 2013 compared to the previous year – according to new figures from IMRG-Capgemini. The way we shop has changed dramatically and consumers are looking for alternatives to complicated checkout processes, where they need to enter card details each time.

Increasingly, many transactions are made on your phone while on the go, and getting out your card to enter its details can feel like an unnecessary and time-consuming hassle. We believe that mobile is going to be key to the future of payments and that Digital Wallets will have a big part to play.

Our 1-Tap mobile payments product that was launched at the start of 2012 has been very successful, clear evidence of just how much customer demand there is for convenient and secure mobile payment products.

The digital wallet market is an extremely dynamic area with many global organisations vying to take advantage of the continued growth in online transactions.

Like Skrill, the firm behind Zapp– VocaLink – is UK-based, and the support that five leading banks are giving them is a massive endorsement for British business and technology. We welcome VocaLink to the market and see this announcement as further evidence that European companies are leading the way in new and innovative digital payment methods.