Nuvei, The peak season confidence gap research, 2026.
The peak seasonconfidence gap
Why enterprise retailers feel ready for their biggest season, and why the data says otherwise
Nuvei asked 150 enterprise retail leaders how ready their payments really are for peak season. Almost nine in ten told us their infrastructure is not ready for it.
What we found
In 2026, retail leaders are preparing harder than ever for the holiday season, and put more of that work into payments than into any other part of the business.
93%
of retail leaders say the holiday season drives between 11 and 40 percent of their annual revenue
79%
of retail leaders put a large share of their holiday preparation into payment readiness
Top 5 takeaways from the study
- 89%say their payment infrastructure fell short last holiday season, even with payments as their top priority.
- 77%say their checkout is fully optimized, yet most still saw payments fail. Confidence is running ahead of the evidence.
- 70%name declined transactions as the top cause of abandoned purchases, ahead of checkout design.
- 1%automatically recover a failed payment. For everyone else, a decline is where the sale ends.
- 47%say their biggest barrier is not knowing which approach to take, not budget or technology.
Part one
The five takeawaysfrom the survey
I. Retailers put payments first.But payments still fell short.
Retailers in our study went into last holiday season with payments at the top of the plan. But almost nine in ten still said the infrastructure they rely on gave way at the busiest moment of the year, from declined transactions to breakdowns across channels.
89%
of retail leaders say their payment infrastructure fell short in a meaningful way last holiday season
And these are not small businesses either. 74% of surveyed businesses run more than a billion dollars a year. For most of them, the holiday period is up to 40% of that. When payments fall short at that scale, the damage is immediate, and not only financial: 44% report customer frustration, 41% lost revenue, and 39% harm to their brand. The cost shows up in both money and in trust.
For many retailers, payment readiness is now a board-level concern, not just a technical one. The gap is no longer effort. It is knowing whether that effort is paying off.
“What I would change is making payments more reliable during busy shopping periods.”
Enterprise retail leader, in their own words
II. Confidence in payments setupis running ahead of the evidence
Asked to rate their payment setup, most retailers grade themselves highly: checkout is optimized, payments work across every channel, problems get caught early. But asked what actually happened last season, the same companies report widespread failures.
A further 75% say they have strong or complete visibility into why payments fail. 70% are sure they would catch a problem before it hit revenue. Then 89% watched something break anyway.
The most expensive belief in payments is that they are already handled. Seeing a problem and being ready for it are not the same thing, and the retailers we've studied have mistaken one for the other. Closing the gap starts with measuring real performance.
III. Declined transactions drive morecart abandonment than checkout design
We asked retailers to name the biggest causes of abandoned purchases, choosing as many as applied. Checkout design, shipping costs and verification all show up. But the one named most often is simpler and harder to see: the payment was tried, and it was declined.
70%
of retail leaders name declined transactions as the top cause of abandoned purchases
For years the abandonment conversation has been about page speed, form fields and shipping costs. Now, retailers are pointing somewhere less visible and more costly. And some of the damage is self-inflicted: 69% say their own fraud checks block real customers at least occasionally, and 17% say it happens often.
The biggest conversion opportunity left in commerce may not be in the checkout at all. It is whether the payment goes through, and what happens the moment it does not.
IV. When a payment fails,nothing happens next
Having named declines as their biggest source of lost sales, retailers were asked what their systems do the moment a payment fails. For most, the answer was nothing beyond telling the customer. In most cases we've surveyed, recovering or retrying the payment another way is almost absent.
A failed payment is the moment revenue is won or lost, and for most retailers it goes unattended. The tools to recover a decline, retry logic, alternative routing, a prompt to try another method, are proven and available for merchants.
Knowing declines are the problem is not the same as having a plan for them. Recovery is the clearest place to win revenue back before next season. When a payment is declined, this is where most shoppers give up on the purchase.
When a payment is declined, this is where most shoppers give up on the purchase.
1%
of retailers recover a declined payment automatically
“Having clearer information on payment declines would help us fix problems faster and prevent lost orders.”
Enterprise retail leader, in their own words
V. Retailers know they need to improve.However, few know how.
Every retailer we surveyed knows payments need work before the next peak season hits. We asked what is standing in the way. 47% of retail leaders said the biggest barrier is not knowing which approach to take.
At the same time, only 43% believe today's payment problems are solvable before the next holiday season. 41% plan to enter markets that need new local payment methods in the next year, and another 45% are weighing it. Notably, the help retailers want most is human: 58% value fast access to knowledgeable people over any automated tool.
Retailers need a clear path and a payment partner who can show the path forward, not simply offer another problem to solve.
Retailers prepared harder than ever for this season and payments still fell short when the volume arrived. That is not a planning problem, it is a performance problem, and it shows up in approval rates on the busiest days of the year.
What retail leaders wouldchange first
“All I really want is a checkout experience that feels fast and effortless for customers regardless of how they choose to pay.”
Enterprise retail leader, in their own words
“The priority should be creating a payment environment that scales with demand without affecting the customer experience.”
Enterprise retail leader, in their own words
“The biggest thing for me is getting payment data into the hands of business teams faster so decisions can be made while the holiday season is still underway rather than after it is over.”
Enterprise retail leader, in their own words
“Quicker payment processing would help us keep up with higher holiday transaction volumes.”
Enterprise retail leader, in their own words
“Greater visibility into payment patterns would help us make decisions with more confidence and respond faster to changing customer needs.”
Enterprise retail leader, in their own words
“I would improve coordination between finance and payment providers to minimize disruptions during seasonal spikes.”
Enterprise retail leader, in their own words
“I would like to draw a clearer link between what we're seeing in payments and what is happening across the business.”
Enterprise retail leader, in their own words
Every fix above has one shopper in mind: the one standing at checkout when the season peaks.
$250m+
in annual revenue at every retailer these answers come from
Part two
What we makeof all of it
Nuvei's read on the findings, and what we think retailers should do with the time they have before the next peak season starts.
The Nuvei takeon what peak season readiness research showed
Despite multiple data points, taken together, the answers describe one problem, not five. Retailers went into peak season with payments at the top of the plan, and almost nine in ten still watched their setup fall short when the volume arrived. Confidence held right up to the moment a payment was declined, and a decline is the moment most shoppers walk away.
What's more important is that almost none of that revenue comes back on its own.
What holds retailers back is not budget or data. It is knowing where to start. Most are planning targeted fixes for specific gaps rather than changing how payments work, which is why the same problems come back every November and December. The retailers who close the gap treat approval rates, recovery of declined payments and performance under load as things they watch all year, not things they check the week before the season starts.
A declined payment is the last thing a shopper wants to see in December, and most of those sales are never won back. Recovering them is one of the fastest ways a retailer can grow revenue without spending more to bring people to checkout.
Prepare forpeak season 2026
Declined transactions are the number one reason shoppers abandon a purchase, and almost no retailer recovers them. Nuvei helps enterprise retailers turn declined payments into recovered revenue, across every market and channel they sell in, during peak seasons and in between them.
Research conducted by Retail Dive, commissioned by Nuvei. 150 senior retail leaders, all Director level and above, at companies with 250 million dollars or more in annual revenue across Europe, the United States and Canada.
The fullsurvey
Every question we asked, and how retail leaders answered. Pick a theme, then step through the cards.