Customers use e-payment services at TPBank’s Livebank (Source: VNA)Hanoi (VNS/VNA) - The Government should create anecosystem and suitable environment for new products and services as well aspioneer their use to promote the development of contactless payment methods.This could be a foundation for building e-government in Vietnam.
Vu Viet Ngoan, Chief of the Advisory Committee to the PrimeMinister, made the statement at a conference on how contactless paymentssupport the establishment of a modern and effective e-government by leveragingthe development of a digital economy held in Hanoi last week.
Ngoan said the technological gap had been reduced from 20 to10 years. This was the reason that firms without new business ideas would lagbehind.
“In the conditions of a sharing economy, businesses shouldmake links that combine fintech with banks and credit institutions fordevelopment,” he added.
According to the master plan to develop non-cash payment in Vietnamby 2020, all supermarkets, commercial centres and modern distribution unitsshould accept card payments. In this case the rate of cash payments would bejust 10 percent. The market would have over 300,000 devices accepting POS.
Additionally, the plan would also focus on non-cash paymentin rural and remote areas to bring the rate of people over 15 years old withbank accounts to at least 70 percent by 2020.
Over the past two years, the application of non-cash andcontactless payment methods in the country has risen. Statistics from the StateBank of Vietnam showed that financial transactions through mobile phones in2017 rose by 81 percent while those made online also increased by 67 percentfrom the previous year.
The country now has 78 organisations providing online paymentservices and another 41 offering such services through mobile phones.
By the end of September 2017, the number of transactionsthrough mobile phones in Vietnam reached more than 90 million, with a totalvalue of 423 trillion VND (18.63 billion USD).
Non-cash payment technologies and methods have become morediversified. Banks and fintech firms have co-operated to introduce new andmodern technologies based on mobile devices.
Sharing the ideas, Truong Van Phuoc, Acting Chairman of theNational Financial Supervision Commission, said the rapid development oftechnologies in the global financial sector has brought benefits andopportunities for consumers, businesses and management agencies.
AsVietnam has become more deeply integrated into the world economy, a modernfintech foundation could help the country’s banking and finance sectoreffectively participate in the global value chain, thus allowing breakthroughsfor Vietnam, he added.
Dao Minh Tuan, Chairman of the Vietnam Bank Card Associationand Deputy General Director of Vietcombank, said Vietnam has 77 million bankcards in circulation. However, a high number of such cards have recorded justsmall payments or even no transaction.
Notably, the amount of non-cash payment transactions in Vietnamhas been low in comparison with other countries in the region, he said, addingthat the habits and thoughts of Vietnamese people are to blame for the lowrate, Tuan said.
He said that people in the country are still hesitant toshare personal information online. In addition, most buyers want to check theproduct before purchase.
To promote non-cash payments in Vietnam, he suggested thatbanks should apply new payment technologies and methods to increase convenienceto card holders.
The solutions include tokenization (using token codes toreplace card numbers) in online payments and at POS locations. In addition, theapplication of QR code payments should be expanded.
Experts said QR payment services have risen in popularity inmany countries. WeChat Pay and Tencent in China have surpassed 900 millionusers, while Alibaba and Alipay have over 500 million users. The total activenumber is equal to the entire Chinese population. In Japan, QR codes have alsoseen strong development.
Catching up the trend, some businesses and banks have quicklyapplied QR codes and attracted a large number of users, including TPBank andVNPAY.
TPBank successfully developed QuickPay as an app on bothAndroid and iOS platforms. The rate of people using the app has increased 165 percentper month since launch. Merchants accepting QR code payments have seen revenuesincrease by 7 to 10 percent.
Meanwhile, VNPAY has also integrated QR Pay in the mobilebanking applications of many banks, including TPBank, Vietcombank, VietinBankand Agribank. The payment method allows customers using the mobileapplication of banks to scan QR codes to make quick payments for goods andservices.
However, banks said the biggest barrier for the paymentmethod in Vietnam was a lack of a common standard, causing difficulties forco-operation between banks and payment firms.
A representative from National Payment Corporation of Vietnam(NAPAS) said the central bank has completed a basic standard on QR Codetechnology for payments in Vietnam, which could be rolled out in the thirdquarter of the year.-VNS/VNA
VNA
