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Cover Story continued

"That means ISOs, payfacs and processors are not
selling payment processing anymore; they are selling
access to business reasoning and true 'enterprise
resource planning [ERP]' made possible with bring
your own AI," Crone said.

What are consumers saying and doing?
So what do consumers think about agentic commerce?
The payment processor Worldpay recently queried
8,000 consumers across seven countries, compiling the
results in a tome titled The agentic commerce report.
Globally, around 40 percent of consumers in the
study said they are open to letting AI agents do their
shopping; only 27 percent rejected the idea outright.
Enthusiasm is highest in China, Worldpay reported,
while the United States mirrors the global perspective.

Not surprisingly, age is the biggest dividing line, with
younger consumers more inclined (50 percent, globally)
to let AI agents do their shopping. Gender also plays a
role, with men in western markets (like the U.S., U.K.,
France and Australia) more willing to use AI agents,
while women lead interest in Brazil and Singapore.

Despite their interest, many consumers expressed
concerns that could temper adoption of agentic
commerce. Five concerns topped the list, being cited
by more than half those surveyed. These were:
• Identity theft (cited by 55 percent of surveyed
consumers)
• Incorrect purchases (55 percent)
• Unauthorized purchases (54 percent)
• Fraud (53 percent)
• Losing financial control (51 percent)

Across markets, consumers want reassurances that
they can trust the process—the ability to intervene if
things go awry. Fraud protections (cited by 54 percent),
the ability to cancel transactions within 24 hours (50
percent), and the ability to review purchases before
completion top the list of trust builders.

Even so, consumers are nowhere near ready to offload
all their shopping onto AI agents. Within five years,
consumers expect only about 10 percent of their
shopping to be done using AI agents. In-store shopping
is still preferred by a majority of consumers (37 percent),
especially older consumers. "While AI and automation
will enhance convenience and efficiency, physical
retail will remain the cornerstone of commerce for
years to come," Worldpay concluded.

Patti Murphy is senior editor at The Green Sheet, president of
ProScribes Ink (www.proscribes.net) and self-described payments
maven of the fourth estate. Her Today in Payments reports are a
regular feature of the Merchant Sales Podcast.

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