Digital payment policy impact analysis on the intention to use QRIS (quick response code Indonesian standard) during COVID-19 pandemic

TL;DR

This study evaluates how Bank Indonesia's QRIS policy influenced user adoption during COVID-19 by disentangling policy effects from pandemic-related factors using a novel model and survey data.

Contribution

It introduces a new variation of the UTAUT model to separate policy impact from pandemic effects in technology adoption analysis.

Findings

Perceived central bank policy significantly affects QRIS adoption.

Pandemic risk influences the intention to use QRIS.

The measurement approach effectively assesses policy impact on behavior.

Abstract

This study aims to evaluate the adoption of Bank Indonesia's QRIS (Quick Response code Indonesian Standard) payment system policy. The evaluation is hindered by the contemporaneous emergence of the COVID-19 pandemic, which acts as a confounding factor in adopting the new payment instrument. To disentangle the impact of central bank policy from the pandemic, a novel variation of the model of Unified Theory of Acceptance and Use of Technology (UTAUT) is proposed and is estimated using purposive sampling from an online survey with 572 respondents during the pandemic. The result of the study successfully disentangles the policy effect from the pandemic effect, and also separate the risk of pandemic with common risks (PR) and other technology adoption determinants. The results indicate that perceived central bank policy and pandemic risk are the most influential variables affecting the intention to use QRIS. The findings suggest that this measurement approach can be appropriately used as a complementary tool to examine the effectiveness of the central bank's policy in influencing people's behavior.