Visa Says Better Onboarding Decides Who Wins the Digital Wallet

Digital credentials are reshaping payments as consumers gravitate toward payment methods that work instantly, securely and consistently across channels.

That shift is creating a dynamic where issuers are exploring opportunities to build smarter onboarding processes that start customers on a personalized financial journey from day one.

Visa VP of Digital Issuer Solutions Portfolio Jeffrey Chen said in the inaugural PYMNTS’ “Beyond the Card” series that onboarding is no longer a narrow technical step. It is becoming the foundation for how consumers pay, track their goals and interact with their financial institutions.

The Rise of Credentials and New Payment Methods

As real-time rails and alternative payment methods gain ground, the traditional card number is no longer the anchor. Consumers expect seamless payment options that extend well beyond the plastic in their wallets and work across platforms such as Apple Pay and new account-to-account rails.

Chen said the movement from a 16-digit PAN to a flexible digital credential changes everything because the credential can support a broader range of payment types and the surrounding digital experiences. “To me, everything comes down to the consumer,” he said. “What a consumer ultimately wants is the holistic end-to-end capability, and they want to know that everything surrounding the payment is also taken care of.”

A credential, he added, is inherently more secure and easier to deploy across new rails. It gives issuers the ability to future-proof payment experiences by building intelligence and orchestration layers once, then applying them across use cases as new payment types emerge.

Why Smart Onboarding Matters

Chen defined smart onboarding as giving consumers the right financial tools, guidance and digital experiences on day one. “Smart onboarding is all about how you set a consumer up with the right set of financial support, the right set of digital experiences on day one, so that it works seamlessly always on behind the scenes on the consumer’s behalf,” he said.

Visa is pairing near real-time authorization data with new front-end experiences that issuers can use inside their own mobile apps. This allows consumers to share preferences with their issuers, articulate financial goals and receive personalized content promptly.

That data, combined with existing payments intelligence, becomes the engine for recommendations, alerts and ongoing optimization.

One early use case gaining traction is personal financial management. Chen said consumers can declare spending goals and receive tailored offers or monthly tracking updates. “That’s one example of Visa is helping issuers collect new information — with consumer consent — to ultimately drive towards better personalized outcomes,” he told PYMNTS.

Fixing Traditional Onboarding Pain Points

Legacy onboarding still breaks easily. When a consumer loses a card, for example, they typically reenter the new card number into Apple Pay or other digital wallets. Issuers must depend on fragmented processes that fail to carry over stored credentials or preferences.

Chen described the old model as a mix of technical and process limitations. “Oftentimes folks who handle the process say it’s a tech challenge, folks who handle the tech side say it’s a process challenge, and you can’t get to where you need to go without the other,” he observed. The deeper blocker, he added, is infrastructure. Many issuers still run batch-based systems that cannot capture or act on real-time information.

In contrast, Visa is building capabilities to help issuers automatically replace compromised card numbers and remap the associated digital credentials. The consumer no longer needs to reload wallets or reconfigure apps. “It enables way more seamless experiences for the consumer so that they can get back to spending without a lot of the heavy manual work,” Chen said.

The Urgency Behind Personal Finance and Data-Driven Journeys

The “Beyond the Card” focused on what consumers are looking for, and how Issuers can ensure they are putting consumers first, detailing Visa’s efforts to support those issuers.

Visa sees growing demand for onboarding that immediately sets consumers up with actionable insights, debt-management tools and credit-score tracking. The availability of high-quality near real-time data allows issuers to embed these capabilities in a way that matches consumer expectations and addresses long-standing gaps in financial literacy and support.

Chen said Visa’s priority is maximizing consumer choice by designing credentials that travel across payment types and enable consistent digital experiences — guided by a principle of orchestrating solutions “in such a way where you maximize the optionality that consumers have so they ultimately can decide what works best for them,” he said.