Dutch shoppers break debit card record in stores on the day before Christmas

People in the Netherlands whipped out their debit cards to make over 25 million payments in stores on Saturday. That set a new national record for most debit card transactions recorded in a single day for purchases at brick-and-mortar stores.

Approximately 809 million euros changed hands in the transactions, the Dutch Payments Association confirmed on Monday. The total amount of money spent was about ten percent higher than in 2022 and 2019. The number of transactions was about 15 percent higher than on the busiest shopping days in those two years.

The busiest time on the Saturday before Christmas was 2:15 p.m. At that moment, about a thousand debit card payments were made per second.

During the entire week leading up to Christmas, there was a 5 percent increase in debit card payments compared to the same period last year, according to the Payments Association.

The Geldmaat automated cash machines were also very busy on Friday. Approximately 173 million euros was withdrawn in over 653,000 transactions. The number of transactions was 3 percent more than the Friday before Christmas in 2022, but the amount of money withdrawn was 7 percent higher than a year earlier.

Consumers seem to be paying less often with their smartphone or smartwatch during sales and holidays. In October they used these on average 38 percent of the time around the Black Friday retail sales period. On Sinterklaas and Christmas, this was 35 percent.