Western Union confirmed yet again that for a payments company to survive the coronavirus pandemic, it needed to enter the crisis with a strong footing in digital payments.
MoneyGram International's digital transformation came at just the right time, considering walk-in traffic at MoneyGram locations in certain regions of the world was stymied for months by the coronavirus pandemic. But for many people, digital is still no replacement for the human touch.
The growth in remittance providers' digital customer sign-ups accelerated as the U.S. went into a nationwide lockdown in the middle of March, and has continued through the summer despite store reopenings that could pull customers back to their old habits of paying in person.
The coronavirus pandemic has made paper money literally a dirty word, causing a rush to digital payments that may be too fast for Western Union and MoneyGram to keep up with as separate companies.
Consumer remittance behaviors are being forced to change, with senders and recipients moving to mobile wallets, bank accounts, and cards. But many still want cash.