As the Central Bank of Nigerias cashless policy gathers momentum, payment card transactions in the country have increased considerably with over two million card transactions in one week.One of the operators that is driving the cashless economy initiative, Interswitch, said on Monday that over two million cardholders qualified to participate in the second edition of Verve national consumer promo.The Divisional Head, Verve Business, Interswitch, Mrs. Oluwatobi Boshoro, who said this, noted that the cardholders were those who either used their cards for cash withdrawals or made purchases at Point-of-Sale terminals, on the web or mobile devices during the first week of the promo.Of the over two million cardholders, First Bank of Nigeria Plc accounted for 779,049; Keystone Bank Limited, 62,666; Finbank Plc, 42,957; ETB, 3,603; and Skye Bank Plc, 108,317.Others were Oceanic Bank International Plc, 29,785; Wema Bank Plc, 21,368; Intercontinental Bank Plc, 294,019; Sterling Bank Plc, 12,988; Ecobank Plc, 44,460; Fidelity Bank Plc, 7,773 and Mainstreet Bank Limited, 12,173.The Director, Payment and Business Expansion, Interswitch, Mr. Charles Ifedi, who corroborated the figures provided by Boshoro, said the number of e-Payment card users in the country would exceed 10 million as a result of the CBN cashless policy.He noted that the introduction of the cashless policy was meant to encourage bank customers to pick up Verve cards as soon as they opened bank accounts.According to him, Interswitch is working with the banks to push ATM card usage in the country through the Verve promo.This, he said, would reward cardholders who renewed their cards or use the same on ATMs, PoS, web and mobile platforms across the country.The Verve promo will assist the CBN policy, as it is encouraging non-cardholders to embrace card usage, while urging the existing cardholders to use the cards more for payment for goods and services across several touch points such as ATM and Point of Sale terminals, Ifedi said.The CBN, through its cashless policy, has set in motion steps to encourage the banking public to use electronic payment solutions such as ATMs, PoS terminals, web banking, telephone banking and mobile money transfer to reduce the volume of cash in circulation. The first phase of the policy will commence in Lagos in January 2012.As part of the policy, the CBN will install 40,000 new ATMs per 100,000 residents around the state and the number is expected to increase with time as the policy takes effect.The CBN will also procure PoS terminals to boost the cashless economy initiative to transform the Nigerian economy, which is currently 99 per cent cash-based.The Director, Banking Supervision, CBN, Mr. Sam Oni, said, We will also procure POS [locations] that customers will use any time they visit points of sales, either at the airline or shopping mall or even hotels and airports or other public places.In the same vein, the Deputy Governor, CBN, Mr. Tunde Lemo, had earlier told our correspondent in an exclusive interview that embracing the cashless system would help reduce the increasing dominance of cash in the economy.Lemo, who lamented the N34bn spent by the CBN to print naira notes in 2010, said, There is no way we can run an efficient economy if we dont develop e-Payment transactions. We spend billions of naira every year on cash printing. In fact, we spent over N34bn printing cash last year. We cant continue to incur such costs.Banks also spend too much time processing cash. This makes them to focus more on minor functions at the expense of major ones. Banking is not about processing cash. Let them do proper intermediation by ensuring that the bulk of their transactions are more efficient and cost-effective.In view of this, the apex banks deputy governor said the CBN hoped to match the ATM deployment of Mexico by 2012 and PoS penetration of Brazil by 2015.By 2015, we hope to be where Brazil is by deploying additional 350,000 PoS terminals. Remember that we are also making it biometric so that everyone, including those who cannot read and write, will be covered, he added.Meanwhile, investigation by our correspondent had revealed that Payment Terminal Service Providers (licensed by the CBN to deploy and maintain PoS terminals in the country) may have to spend over N90bn to deploy 450,000 PoS terminals across the country between now and 2015.
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