Abstract:

This study was established to determine the extent to which Electronic Payment Methods has improved customers’ patronage of shopping malls in Niger Delta, Nigeria. Dimensions of Electronic Payment Methods such as card payment system, electronic funds transfer and e-wallet payment system were employed alongside increase in repeat purchases to measure the extent of customers’ patronage. A descriptive survey research method of co-relational research design was employed in this study to provide detail investigation of the procedure used to establish the relationship between Electronic Payment Methods and improvement in customers’ patronage of shopping malls in the Niger Delta, Nigeria. The population of the study consisting of 77 registered shopping malls in the Niger Delta, Nigeria from which target population 6890 managers and sale persons were drawn. The Taro Yamane’s formula was used to determine a sample size of 378 managers and sales personnel for the study. A purposive sampling technique was adopted using considerable percentage of representation approach to ensure effective selection of the sample elements of the population. A structured instrument for data collection containing fifteen (15) items questions was used for the study. The face and content validation of the instrument was obtained through the judgment of experts. A test-retest method was used to determine the reliability of the instrument and a reliability index of .83 was obtained. The data collected were presented and analyzed using simple percentage and frequency analysis, mean and standard deviation, while the formulated hypotheses were tested using Pearson Product Moment Correlation of SPSS software program version 23.0 at .05 level of significance. The findings indicated that card payment system, electronic funds transfer and e-wallet payment system has a very strong positive or significant relationship with improvement in customer patronage of shopping malls in the Niger Delta. Based on these findings, it was concluded that Electronic Payment Methods has significantly improves customer patronage, of shopping malls in the Niger Delta, Nigeria. Thus, it was recommended that shopping mall operators in the Niger Delta who are yet to introduce sustainable Electronic Payment Methods should do so immediately to promote customers patronage and improve increase in repeat purchase.