Payments as a driver for customer experience in airline travel

Louis Wapler, Senior Consultant at Edgar, Dunn & Company, explains why payments are a driver for customer experience in airline travel and elaborates on the hidden pain points across three dimensions: payment offering, cost, and authentication.

The customer experience is pivotal in the airline travel industry

Customer experience in travel attracts more scrutiny than perhaps any other industry. No industry generates customer feedback quite like travel. From TripAdvisor reviews to social media posts, travel buyers are vocal about their experiences: rating everything from airline seat comfort to hotel breakfast quality. Yet one critical touchpoint that rarely appears in consumer reviews (until it fails) is payment.

Obsessed with offering the ‘right’ payment methods, the travel industry misses the fact that high-performance payment acceptance requires more than a checklist of different card brands and wallets.

The payment acceptance policy is the backbone of an airline's payment strategy, impacting the cost of acceptance, market reach, and conversion. Yet too many airlines still operate with blanket, one-size-fits-all policies that leave money on the table.

This article explores the hidden pain points across three dimensions: payment offering, cost, and authentication.

How can airlines deliver payment choice when they can’t afford to offer everything?

When sales travel executives discuss their payment acceptance strategy, the conversation typically gravitates toward: ‘Do we accept Apple Pay? What about Pix or PayPal?’. While payment method coverage matters, this focus can obscure a more fundamental challenge: defining a coherent payment acceptance policy across an increasingly complex ecosystem.

In our consulting work with airlines, we have observed a significant evolution in how carriers approach payment acceptance. Airlines today recognise that seamless payment experiences directly impact conversion, customer satisfaction, and loyalty on their direct booking channels. Yet their payment landscape’s complexity (spanning diverse geographies, evolving consumer preferences, and technical requirements) makes optimisation challenging.

A robust payment acceptance policy focuses on five interdependent dimensions:

1. Sales geography (where travellers purchase)
2. Sales channel (direct vs. indirect)
3. Payee profile (leisure, corporate, group, travel agencies)
4. Payment methods (cards, wallets, bank transfers)
5. Payment providers (acquirers, gateways, orchestrators, and fraud prevention providers) 

Our 2025 travel consumer research with Nuvei across five markets revealed that 92% of travellers rate ease of payment as important, yet 17% still experience card declines when booking travel online. More critically, 59% are likely to abandon their purchase if their preferred payment method is unavailable. This underscores a fundamental tension: travellers want frictionless payments, and airlines know about this but still struggle to deliver them consistently across different markets and channels.

Regional patterns emerge when examining the survey data more closely. Based on recent Edgar, Dunn & Company (EDC) client work, Brazilian consumers overwhelmingly prefer Pix (71%), Hong Kong travel buyers choose AliPayHK (29%), and Spanish customers favour Bizum (23%) – preferences that may seem obvious given domestic methods naturally dominate their home markets. But the strategic challenge is not about recognising these preferences; it is deciding how to accept these methods across provider partnerships, channel availability, fraud controls, and cost optimisation.

Consider what ‘accepting Pix’ requires in practice. Which payment provider partners should handle it? On which sales channels should it be available (direct web, mobile app, call centre, travel agents)? How should fraud controls be configured without creating friction? And critically, how do airlines manage the cost implications of adding yet another payment option?

This last question often drives which choices airlines can afford to make. As it turns out, solving the ‘cost of payment acceptance’ equation is often the key to unlocking broader customer choice.

When cost optimisation enables customer choice

As the payment landscape continues to fragment across geographies and consumer segments, customer preferences become increasingly customised. What was once a simple choice between Visa and Mastercard or credit and debit has splintered into dozens of payment methods, each preferred by different customer segments in various markets. This creates a difficult challenge for airlines: travel consumers expect their specific preferred method to be available, yet each additional option introduces cost, technical complexity, and operational overhead.

Card payment costs vary based on where the cardholder is located, where the acquirer is based, and how the transaction is routed. A European cardholder's transaction processed through a US acquirer will incur cross-border fees that local European acquiring would avoid. Beyond cards, accepting alternative payment methods introduces a different set of economics and consumer protections. Real-time bank transfers like Pix in Brazil or Bizum in Spain often carry lower fees than premium credit cards, while card-based wallets and Buy Now, Pay Later (BNPL) solutions sit at the higher end of the cost spectrum. Notably, not all payment methods offer the same level of buyer protection, and cards remain distinct in providing a structured dispute management framework.

The strategic insight lies in recognising that intelligent cost management creates headroom to offer customer-preferred methods that might otherwise appear prohibitively expensive. Our work with a major international airline illustrated precisely this trend. The airline faced unnecessarily high payment costs due to inefficient transaction routing: its primary acquirer processed transactions through international rails rather than local infrastructure, and it lacked direct connectivity to domestic payment schemes, both of which prevented access to lower-cost domestic pricing.

Overall, each airline needs to understand the specific ROI for each payment method: what benefits are associated with each payment method (e.g., decreased costs, increased conversion, new customers, access to specific customer segments) versus potential drawbacks (e.g., higher costs, technical implementation, specific regulatory requirements). In the case of BNPL, for instance, the higher cost of acceptance is mitigated by a higher conversion rate and basket average.

By implementing a multi-acquirer strategy with local acquirers in strategic markets, the airline achieved close to 20% cost savings on payment processing. This move enabled transactions to be handled domestically, carrying lower fees than international routing. Additionally, contracting with acquirers who also operate as issuers unlocked ‘on-us’ pricing on specific transaction flows, significantly reducing payment costs. These savings did not simply improve the P&L (profit and loss); they funded the expansion of payment method coverage. The cost reductions in core markets created budget to integrate regional alternative payment methods that travel buyers increasingly expect: Pix in Brazil, Bizum in Spain, BLIK in Poland, AliPayHK in Hong Kong, and so on. What initially appeared as a cost optimisation exercise became an enabler of customer choice.

The business case for strategic cost optimisation becomes clear when considering that 59% of travellers are likely to abandon their booking if their preferred payment method is unavailable, according to the joint survey conducted by Nuvei and Edgar, Dunn & Company.

The authentication strategy should be dynamic to avoid friction

The strategic question is how to balance security with conversion and whether a single authentication approach serves all markets equally.

A recent engagement with a major airline revealed the hidden costs of blanket authentication policies. The airline had implemented systematic 3D Secure authentication across all transactions globally to minimise fraud exposure. On the surface, this appeared prudent: requiring additional verification for every payment, regardless of geography or risk profile.

The results told a different story. In markets where 3D Secure was mandatory (for instance, in the EU and the UK in this case), customer behaviour aligned with expectations, and the process introduced minimal friction. However, in markets where 3D Secure remains optional (including the US and parts of Asia-Pacific), the airline observed significantly higher abandonment rates during checkout.

The root cause wasn't the authentication itself, but the disconnect between customer expectations and the payment experience delivered. In markets where 3D Secure is not standard practice, asking for an extra verification becomes a conversion barrier rather than a security feature.

The solution required moving from static rules to dynamic authentication by implementing risk-based 3D Secure that took into account transaction value, market norms, cardholder history, and fraud signals, tailoring authentication requirements to a specific context. High-risk transactions were strongly authenticated, but low-risk payments in markets unaccustomed to 3D Secure could proceed with no or minimal friction.

The business impact proved substantial. Approval rates increased in previously underperforming markets, with particularly strong improvements during peak booking periods. Authentication abandonment (customers who initiated checkout but dropped off during verification) decreased significantly.

Airlines that recognise authentication as a commercial lever (not purely a security function) will outperform those applying uniform policies across diverse markets and customer segments.

The unfair paradox for the travel industry

Customer experience in travel rests on a paradox: when payments work seamlessly, travellers barely notice them – but when they fail (through a declined card, a missing payment method, or an unexpected authentication hurdle), that friction often becomes the defining memory of the booking journey.

The three dimensions (payment offering, payment cost, and payment authentication) explored in this article reveal how airlines can help resolve this paradox. Method availability ensures travellers encounter payment options that feel natural and trustworthy in their market. Cost optimisation creates the financial headroom to offer those choices without compromising profitability. And authentication strategy balances security requirements with the low-friction experience customers expect. Airlines that turn payments into a frictionless, choice‑rich moment in the customer journey won’t just reduce drop‑off – they will win share, data, and loyalty every time a customer clicks ‘pay now’.

These dimensions are interdependent. An airline that optimises costs on core transactions gains budget to expand method coverage in strategic markets.

Treating payment acceptance as a strategic customer experience lever rather than merely a technical checklist will help capture the bookings lost by the competition. In an industry where margins are thin and customer loyalty is hard-won, getting payments right may be the most underappreciated driver of a competitive advantage. In other words, the checkout page has become one of the most powerful battlegrounds for revenue and retention – and most airlines are still fighting it with yesterday’s tools. Edgar, Dunn & Company’s close collaboration with many airlines across the globe has uncovered how payments can become a differentiating advantage. Do not hesitate to contact us to discuss further about how to turn payments into a strategic lever.

This article is part of The Paypers’ Travel Series, which includes contributions on topics spanning emerging trends in travel payments, fraud and security challenges, regulatory and tax impacts, risk management and forex, as well as sustainability in the travel industry. For a complete overview of all the contributions featured, click here. 

About the author

Louis Wapler is a Senior Consultant at the Edgar, Dunn & Company Paris office. He joined the firm in March 2021 and graduated with an MBA from ESCP Business School in 2020. Prior to joining EDC, Louis had combined seven years of experience in the banking and aviation industries. Louis enjoys witnessing the modernisation of payments and payment-related processes in B2B ecosystems that drive the ongoing change of the financial institutions’ landscape.

 

About Edgar, Dunn & Company (EDC)

Edgar, Dunn & Company (EDC) is an independent global payment and fintech consultancy. The company is widely regarded as a trusted adviser, providing a full range of strategy consulting services, expertise, and market insights. EDC expertise includes M&A due diligence, legal and regulatory support across the payment ecosystem, fintech, mobile payments, digitalisation of retail and corporate payments, and financial services.