PayPak is a Pakistani domestic payment scheme launched by 1 Link under the State Bank of Pakistan Vision 2020.
The world has increasingly come to expect faster payments.
Even the thought of paying for items by a simple swipe of a watch no longer
raises eyebrows. Meanwhile, the process of using payments through electronic
means to curtail unregulated and free markets remains futile for decades in
Pakistan due to the lack of any concrete road map and regulations on electronic
payment usage.
The biggest hindrance to financial inclusion is the high
cost of cards based on international schemes. As a result, a huge proportion of
the population is unbanked and under-served. The unbanked population doesn’t
have access to the banking services and can’t use electronic mediums to pay
utility bills, obtain fast and easy credits, purchase goods, get government
benefits and receive remittances etc.
Integrating digital payments into the economies of emerging
and developing nations addresses crucial issues of broad economic growth and
individual financial empowerment. Digital financial services tied up with
domestic payment scheme will not only promote financial inclusion but also
foster economic growth.
In line with State Bank of Pakistan Vision 2020 to enhance
and promote financial inclusion, 1LINK (Guarantee) Limited launched Pakistan’s
first domestic payment Scheme PayPak aimed at providing efficient,
cost-effective, robust and ubiquitous payments solutions. With this launch,
Pakistan became the 28th country in the world to have their own domestic
payment scheme.
With a domestic payment scheme in place, the following benefits
can be achieved in short term basis:
Benefits
- Transforming the digital payments landscape in the country by ensuring digital financial access to both the un-served and underserved population while at the same time reducing the transaction cost and improving overall efficiency.
- Provides interoperability in the domestic payment ecosystem.
- Acceptability to instantly incorporate government programs at minimum cost.
- Product offerings to expand payment services and broaden access to financial services in Pakistan.
- Bringing up new innovations in technology, specific to domestic aspirations.
- In built scalability capacity for future plans of launching e-Wallet/Pre-paid program.
- Enablement of Person to Person transactions such as card to card based funds transfer by means of various payment instruments.
- Highly cost effective card scheme program.
PayPak Adaption
20
of the country's banks have adopted it. The uptake
of the payment scheme has been slow. As of April 2019, 1.5 million PayPak cards have been issued -
representing 3.5% of the 41.9 million payment cards issued in the country.
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
ReplyDelete