Banks urge State not to pay in cash (26/05)
06/08/2010 - 181 Lượt xem
Tran Ngoc Minh, director of the central bank's Ho Chi Minh City (HCM) City branch, told a seminar in the city on Wednesday: "Non-cash payment will reduce work for executives and increase their efficiency."
The seminar, organised by the State Bank of Viet Nam and Eastern Asia Commercial Bank, concerned the advantages of State officials using bank services and ATM cards.
However, although the ratio of non-cash payments in HCM City increased from 75.96 percent in 2001 to 87 percent last year, payment orders accounted for over two-thirds of these transactions.
ATM cards accounted for a mere 1.6 percent of non-cash payments last year but Minh called it "a promising market for the banks."
Mr. Minh admitted that there were several factors that restricted the development of the ATM card market, such the lack of an adequate legal framework, customers' habits, the locations and numbers of ATMs, and the perceived risk of customers losing money from their accounts to criminals using fake cards. By last year the city had 429 ATMs and 678,743 cards.
Tran Phuong Binh, general director of the Eastern Asian Commercial Bank, said: "We are aware of these challenges. We are improving our security technologies as well as taking a look at interest rates on our customers money."
The city's Social Insurance Department is paying pensions to 600 people in Phu Nhuan district and District 1 and they are able to withdraw money using ATM cards.
Speaking about the experiment, Nguyen Van Thang from the insurance agency said: "In the beginning we were worried about whether old people could use the technology, but after one month, everybody feels comfortable with the new payment system. It will save us a lot of expenditure."
The agency makes pension and social assistance payments of over 100 million VND (6 million USD) each month to over 100,000 people in the city. The numbers are set to increase by 8-10 percent a year. If payments can be accessed through ATM cards, this would be a big saving, Thang said.
Source: VNA
