[vc_single_image image=”22373″ img_size=”full”]

QR codes update restaurants

Future. After pretty much every restaurant started using QR codes for their menus during the pandemic, the next evolution is for them to be used as a way for diners to pay their checks. If adopted, QR codes could easily allow for diners to split the bill or allow for “buy now, pay later” transactions.

Check’s already here
QR codes want to stick around for your whole meal.

• Restaurants are looking to adopt QR codes for diner payments.
• The move could help ease labor shortages (the restaurant industry is one of the hardest hit by The Great Resignation).
• It could also reduce the amount of time diners spend at restaurants (most people wait an average of fifteen minutes to complete paying their check).

The move would make sense — the Independent Restaurant Coalition reports that dining reservations remain 47% lower than the 2019 level, and, according to Global Banking & Finance Review, 55% of diners said that contactless payment is one of the three reasons that they choose a restaurant.

Universal code
We’re not totally ready for a QR cash-register future quite yet, though. Contactless payments are still a bit of a walled garden from restaurant to restaurant, forcing users to download an app. Initiatives like the Financial Data Exchange, which securely transmits data for a third party, could make it a reality.

QR codes are having a moment (popping up in everything from hotel rooms to art installations) and it’s only a matter of time before payment-use is commonplace. Juniper Research estimates that more than half of point-of-sale transactions will be contactless by next year.