1. Introduction
Banks and other classic financial institutions, which centralised market power in the financial system, have controlled financial services for decades. Nonetheless, the financial sector is now undergoing a disruptive structural transformation in the fourth industrial revolution (IR 4.0) era as a result of numerous technological advancements, together with the COVID-19 pandemic that has accelerated the process to stimulate big tech corporations [
1,
2] such as Amazon, Google, Meta, Microsoft, and Alibaba to proactively participate in the financial system. This led to the conception of Financial Technology (FinTech), a financial innovation made possible by technology that affects financial markets, institutions, and the provision of financial services via the introduction of new business models, applications, procedures, or products [
3].
FinTech is a cutting-edge innovation displacing traditional financial services and is rising to prominence globally. There have been over 12,500 start-ups in FinTech, with a global investment of USD 111.2 billion in H2′2022 [
4]. The global FinTech market is anticipated to grow steadily and generate USD 324 billion in market value by 2026, with an increasing compound annual rate of 25.18% over the 2022–2027 forecasted period, due to the currently vast numbers of smart device users who prefer online transactions along with the evidence that FinTech implementation significantly boosts customer experience [
5].
The significant advancements in information technology (IT) and their integration, including the internet of things, artificial intelligence, big data, cloud computing, and blockchain have allowed financial services firms to automate their business processes and fundamentally rationalise the financial services value chain with entirely new and inclusive products, services, processes, and business models that can effectively fulfil the needs and demands of users [
6,
7]. Academic studies back up the idea that FinTech services give consumers access to a dynamic ecosystem because they offer personalisation, flexibility, and simplicity of delivery at a reduced cost, which ultimately boosts productivity, profitability, and financial inclusion [
4,
7]. Besides its qualities that promote the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) [
8,
9], FinTech can make financial businesses more sustainable by promoting green finance [
10]. Additionally, FinTech potentially gives access to financial services to 1.6 billion people in emerging economies. By minimising expenditures and tax revenue leakage, it may boost the amount of loans made to people and businesses by USD 2.1 trillion while also enabling governments to save USD 110 billion annually. It is equally advantageous for financial service providers, who could sustainably increase their balance sheets by up to USD 4.2 trillion while saving USD 400 billion yearly in direct costs [
11]. Substantial FinTech usage can enhance emerging economies’ GDP by USD 3.7 trillion by 2025, or 6% more than the status quo [
11].
The government of the United Arab Emirates (UAE) continues to place a high premium on digital transformation. The UAE’s central bank established a FinTech unit in December 2020, emphasising its dedication towards establishing proper regulations, privacy and data protection, low carbon and green FinTech, and inclusive financial services, as well as towards developing a mature FinTech ecosystem [
12]. The UAE is leading the MENA’s FinTech market, recording a high of USD 2.5 billion with investment growth of 64% reaching USD 819 million in 2022 [
13]. The number of FinTech companies in the UAE is steadily rising. In 2022, there were 189 new licensed FinTech companies taking the total to 303, offering various financial services, including e-payments/transactions, e-wallet, blockchain/cryptocurrency, digital banking/neobanks, InsurTech, WealthTech, RegTech, crowdfunding, peer-to-peer insurance and lending platforms, remittance, and others [
13]. Investors are now encouraged to help regional projects financially thanks to FinTech platforms, hence promoting UAE’s 2030 vision to become a regional and global hub for FinTech and contributing to the country’s overall economic growth [
12].
Across the globe, FinTech services adoption has seen a remarkable increase among consumers from 16% in 2015 to 33% in 2017 and 64% in 2019, with the high adoption rate mainly in nations such as India and China [
14]. However, the UAE has experienced a relatively poor consumer adoption rate, as low as 29% [
15]. Despite the abundance of FinTech options that are accessible, adoption is highly selective, and only a small number of these have been a success. An example is e-payment services used by 84.3% of users, fuelling the growth in the usage of FinTech services [
16]; others have shown lower adoption, including P2P money transfer [31%], robot advisor [27%], InsurTech [19%], crowdfunding [17%], and P2P insurance [10%], according to the national survey by Statista (2020) [
15]. This duality presents the possible issues or obstacles in the use of FinTech. This study is thus inspired to look into the issues preventing clients in the UAE from utilising the existing FinTech services. The diffusion of FinTech is essential in preventing the most disadvantaged segments from significant financial losses, falling behind, attracting potential users, and retaining existing consumers.
For the purpose of marketing technology services in emerging areas, comprehension of the diffusion process is essential. Rogers [
17] asserted that potential users’ readiness to embrace technological innovation is key to ensuring technology’s success and widespread adoption. Yet, limited comprehensive research findings have identified the factors influencing the use of FinTech [
3]. Several studies examining the obstacles to the adoption and application of FinTech were found in the recent systematic literature analysis [
18], most of which focused on the payment sector. Studies have been conducted to evaluate the FinTech phenomenon [
19,
20,
21,
22,
23,
24,
25]. They mainly concentrated on particular characteristics that are personal attributes of clients. However, they failed to take into account the individual, technological, organisational, and environmental characteristics that, when taken together, would provide a solid theoretical foundation for fully comprehending consumers’ perceptions [
26,
27]. The technology acceptance model (TAM) has been heavily cited in the literature by numerous researchers looking into how FinTech services are being adopted. The unified theory of acceptance and use of technology (UTAUT), which is regarded as a solid motivational basis characterising consumer behaviour towards technology, has received little empirical support [
25]. Thus, a theoretical need was identified in the literature to broadly explore the challenges affecting consumers’ FinTech usage based on the UTAUT model. Contextually, the existing studies have been mainly experimented within East Asia. Their findings might not be practical in diverse Middle Eastern contexts such as the UAE due to the prevalence of distinctive consumer behaviour, cultural settings, social infrastructure, and economic indicators. As a result, it was determined that studies on the adoption of FinTech should be performed for each country. The majority of authors took a positivist approach to research designs by merely employing cross-sectional surveys to validate an altered research model. Their determinants were created by synthesising prior research and accepted hypotheses. As they ignored the mixed-method approach that merges the strengths of quantitative and qualitative approaches in a single study to determine the methodological contributions, most models were therefore primarily classified as restricted and tactical.
The study aimed to address the following research questions (RQs) in order to close the aforementioned research gaps:
RQ1: What challenges affect consumers’ usage of FinTech services in the UAE?
RQ2: What effects do individual, technological, organisational, and environmental factors have on consumers’ intention to use FinTech services?
RQ3: Is the UTAUT model relevant for explaining consumers’ use of FinTech services in the UAE?
Unlike the extant studies, this study essentially is a fresh attempt to bridge the identified theoretical, methodological, and contextual gaps by exploring the obstacles preventing consumers from using FinTech services using a mixed-method approach and extending the UTAUT framework in the UAE. The FinTech literature can benefit from the advancements made by this study. First, it facilitates identifying the numerous issues affecting the uptake of FinTech services among UAE consumers. Second, it employs and experimentally extends the UTAUT model in forecasting the uptake of FinTech services, particularly to the applicability and generalizability of the UTAUT in new contexts. Third, the study uses both qualitative and quantitative approaches in a mixed-method approach, thus paving the way for a clearer understanding of the intricate interrelationships between the new elements influencing the uptake of FinTech services. Lastly, the results of this study provide insightful perspectives for researchers and help managers and policymakers to create successful plans for influencing consumers’ digital usage behaviour.
7. Discussion and Conclusions
7.1. Meta-Inference
Meta-inference was used in conjunction with the bridge technique to reconcile the qualitative and quantitative data in order to evaluate the study’s conclusions [
133,
134]. According to the qualitative data study, consumer awareness and individual inventiveness are important personal elements that might accelerate the acceptance of FinTech services. The qualitative findings also suggested that the technical aspects of FinTech might operate as impediments, whereas system quality, security, and privacy may have the greatest bearing. The informants also emphasised that the organisational, motivational forces or barriers for consumers were constrained by their value judgements of the features of firms (i.e., reputation). Additionally, it was determined that important environmental constraints impacting consumers’ propensity to use FinTech services included government-related policies, regulations, and incentives. The quantitative data analysis mostly supported the preliminary qualitative findings, which revealed that consumer awareness, innovation, system quality, and reputation of FinTech providers have a substantial influence on consumers’ inclination to use FinTech services.
Meanwhile, the effects of governmental support, as well as security and privacy, were negligible. Accordingly, the majority of the qualitative findings could be generalised using quantitative research according to the study’s findings, which suggests that the mixed-method approach successfully bridges the qualitative and quantitative research gaps and synchronises the advantages of both research methodologies. Cross-referencing the empirical results in both research methodologies is beneficial to deepen comprehension of the specific research issue.
7.2. Discussion
This study shows that the usefulness of FinTech services in managing finances, ensuring efficiency, and saving time (i.e., performance expectancy), together with the accessibility of the necessary technical resources for users (i.e., facilitating conditions), could significantly increase consumers’ intention to use FinTech services. The underlying cause behind such a result is the novelty of such service in the culture of the UAE, where most errands are preferred to be served in a traditional manner from physical locations. These findings are consistent with the UTAUT paradigm and earlier research [
23,
52,
58,
59]. Effort expectancy was insignificant, in contrast to the UTAUT model’s assertion. This means that clients do not typically evaluate the significance of FinTech services based on their practicality, simplicity of use, interactivity, or competence. This behaviour may be attributed to reluctance and a lack of creativity when trying new services. These results may also be linked to different societal characteristics and principles influencing people’s perceptions [
135]. Likewise, this study found the negligible impact of social influence. This might be explained by the users’ perception of financial concerns as a solitary and private activity, which justifies their sparse information sharing with peers and lessens the effect of peer pressure. Another reason for this finding is that the majority of the sampled respondents were young adults (18 to 39 years old), i.e., members of Gen Y who were born and raised in the technological era. This generation differs from Gen X in that it is more “self-directed” [
70]. These conclusions suggest that the UTAUT model is relevant for explaining consumers’ use of FinTech services in the UAE.
This study’s two investigation phases demonstrated that consumer knowledge strongly influences consumers’ intention to use FinTech services. This indicates that empowered individuals may find them practical for managing their financial tasks. The use intention of a consumer would be positively influenced by prior information and educated curiosity regarding the existence, objectives, and numerous benefits of FinTech. This outcome is in line with past studies [
81,
82,
83,
136]. This result signifies that people are likely to be aware and find it meaningful to use FinTech services as it would benefit them in managing their financial tasks efficiently.
The qualitative and quantitative findings suggest that clients with higher degrees of inventiveness should have more favourable attitudes about FinTech services with a significant predictive relevance and substantial effect size. Hence, personal innovativeness is a significant barrier for consumers to use FinTech services, leading to poor uptake. These findings suggest that less innovative users may not prefer the new services as they are a relatively creative and advanced approach that is technologically different from other traditional banking methods. The reason for such behaviour might be the lack of understanding about the services, lack of an innovation mindset, uncertainty about the technology itself, fear of failing, and the time and effort that has to be spent to understand and master those innovative services. This conclusion backs the findings of previous research [
70,
90].
Security and privacy, according to bank specialists, are crucial for increasing consumers’ intentions to use FinTech services. The consumers did not, however, seem to share this impression throughout the quantitative phase, indicating that security and privacy issues did not rank highly with UAE consumers. The consumers’ upbeat opinions might be linked to the strict secrecy regulations and the reliable framework of the UAE’s financial sector, which is one of the most renowned and well-established in the world. Additionally, the idea of desensitisation, whereby society is used to living and working in a vulnerable environment, may be connected to decreased customer anxiety about impending security dangers and privacy violations. The consumers, on the other hand, were apprehensive about system quality. It became clear that they are drawn to a system’s capabilities and dependability. This is in line with the assertion of existing literature, which showed that when a technology system’s quality is improved, customer perception is significantly affected [
102,
103,
104,
105]. In both study phases, it was also shown that a company’s reputation has a substantial influence on consumers’ intentions to use FinTech. This suggests that having a high reputation indicates that a company offers dependable services due to its integrity and goodwill. Consumers today greatly rely on an organisation’s reputation in the market because there are more possible negative implications of choosing the wrong service providers. Customer intent is, therefore, driven mainly by a company’s prestige in the marketplace. This backs up the argument made in the literature that corporate reputation is an intangible organisational driver of technology adoption [
116,
117,
137].
Furthermore, the bank professionals revealed throughout the qualitative phase that governmental support is an environmental factor which improves clients’ inclination to use FinTech services. The consumers, however, did not believe that the UAE government’s involvement had changed their intentions. This could be due to the fact that the governmental measures have not been successful or that the users believe that the measures have no effect on their decision to utilise such services.
7.3. Theoretical Implication
The empirical results of this study significantly advance academic knowledge on how consumers use FinTech services. Firstly, the study looked at six new elements that could explain the difficulties faced by clients in the UAE when using FinTech services. Secondly, the study increased the UTAUT model’s relevance and reliability in justifying the uptake of FinTech services in the UAE. Third, the study provided an overview of the important UTAUT factors influencing Emirati consumers’ acceptance of FinTech services. The model’s ability to explain a large amount of variance demonstrates the UTAUT framework’s applicability and effectiveness to this study. It is noteworthy that the main contributions not only replicate the UTAUT model in a new environment but also considerably advance the theory by integrating six new critical components. The PLS predict analysis demonstrated that the study’s model had medium predictive power as a broader theoretical contribution. This suggests that the model may produce testable predictions and reliably forecast reactions from beyond the sample.
Through the use of two complimentary analytical techniques, TCA and PLS-SEM, this research adds to the body of existing FinTech literature. By putting out six fresh combinations of obstacles preventing the use of FinTech services, TCA made a significant contribution to the findings. Additionally, the PLS-SEM results demonstrated the overall impacts of the newly added factors and UTAUT variables on the uptake of FinTech services. The subsequent findings supported the hypothesis that some variables, which were unimportant in the PLS-SEM analysis, could encourage the use of FinTech when combined with other variables.
7.4. Practical Implications
The study’s findings can assist scholars and policymakers in better understanding the effects of FinTech. The study can serve as a useful resource in creating effective policies that aim to maximise the advantages for mass consumers, service providers, and the national economy. The study explored and discussed how various individual, technological, organisational, and environmental attributes affect the intention of consumers to use FinTech services. The study offers a model for practitioners by better describing the actual difficulties that their clients face when utilising FinTech services. In order to ensure a smooth transition to digital consumer behaviour, it offers a robust framework for policy design and the planning and coordination of development strategies.
According to the study results, FinTech service providers in the UAE should focus less on social influence and more on the unique characteristics of their consumers, such as awareness and encourage their innovativeness to boost their perceptions via direct marketing. In order to maintain consistency in quality, FinTech providers should focus on providing helpful, accessible, quick, convenient, functional, and flexible services instead of focusing on security and privacy precautions, which are the areas that consumers in the UAE care about the least. Additionally, a company should maintain a strong reputation in the marketplace instead of seeking governmental backing because this intangible asset is essential for luring consumers to use FinTech services.
As practical incentives to stimulate the use of FinTech services, potential users would be offered practical financial services delivery channels in the shape of pleasant and quick service quality combined with strong security and reliability at more affordable costs. FinTech embracing will also enable FinTech companies to lower high operational expenses and avoid the waste associated with traditional processes. Economic improvements, digitalisation, social advantages, and sustainability goals are other incentives for using FinTech.
7.5. Limitations and Future Directions
To give the necessary insight for particular scenarios, this study primarily investigated the idea of FinTech services from a demand viewpoint (consumers). However, because one study cannot address all of these difficulties at once, it did not test the idea from the supply side. Hence, this study suggests that future research looks into the obstacles to FinTech adoption from the standpoint of FinTech providers. A deeper understanding of consumer behaviour could also be attained by including the moderating role of demographic parameters such as gender and age. Re-investigating the study’s research model in diverse industrial segments such as hospitality, healthcare, or education, and in other contexts such as the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) or the Developing-8 (D-8) nations which have similar development indicators to the UAE’s, could help to further validate the conclusions of this study. The study is limited to a geographically specific sample, i.e., the UAE. A noteworthy suggestion for future directions is to conduct a comparative study that compares the results obtained in this study with similar studies conducted, for example, in the EU, the USA, or other parts of the world.