That was the information given by the delegates at the “Promoting nationwide electronic payment” seminar held by the government Portal on the afternoon of October 16.
According to Dang Hoang Hai, director of the Department of E-Commerce and Digital Economy (Ministry of Industry and Trade), although it was considered as an extremely potential market, the market of electronic payment in Vietnam was extremely competitive and fierce. According to Hai, the statistics of the Vietnam Banking Association on electronic payment via internet and mobile phones in Q1/2019 showed that the number and value of financial transactions via internet channels increased by 68.8 percent and 13.4 percent over the same period in 2018. The number and value of financial transactions via mobile phone channels increased by 97.7 percent and 232.3 percent over the same period in 2018.
However, despite the growth of the world’s top, according to the director of the Department of E-Commerce and Digital Economics, the rate of electronic payment in Vietnam was still very low compared to other countries. At the same time, the development segment was also uneven, in which e-commerce mainly used cash in the form of Cash On Delivery (COD)Goods arrive then customers pay by cash.
General director of Viettel Digital Services Corporation Pham Trung Kien also said that Vietnam had a rapid growth rate in the field of electronic payment, but still could not compare to the world. Cash was still king in Vietnam. 90 percent of transactions were still paid with cash. Most of the transaction data only focused on basic operations such as money transfer, water payment, electricity, cable television, Kien said.
Also, according to Kien, using payment by telecommunication accountMobile Money was a deployment trend in many countries around the world. In Vietnam, with the development of payment via telecommunication accounts, Vietnam could promote electronic payment further nationwide to pay for minimal transaction values, from iced tea, parking tickets, coffee, and so on. Despite the convenience and excellent benefits, businesses must accept competition to attract customers through offering incentives, promotions as well as forming usage habits.
To join this market, businesses had to accept costly games. However, everyone had a different approach. Some businesses spent much money to increase the value of a profitable company, and also, some businesses created real value. However, it all required many years to compete, Kien said.
According to general Secretary of Vietnam Association of Financial Investors (VAFI), Phung Anh Tuan, trading by any method had specific risks, mainly due to the supervision mechanism. So was online gambling, all coming from human, technology was just a tool and how they used it. If people found holes to make money quickly, they would do it. Therefore, it was necessary to have a mechanism to protect and monitor risks, Tuan said.
According to data from research firm Statista, in 2017, the number of electronic payments in Vietnam increased by 22 percent over the previous year, with a total transaction value estimated at $6.1 billion. This number was forecast to rise to $12.3 billion by 2022.
Although recorded impressive growth, the proportion of electronic payments in Vietnam was still deficient compared to neighbouring countries. According to the World Bank, Vietnam currently had the lowest number of non-cash transactions in the region at 4.9 percent. This figure was much lower than that of Thailand, with nearly 60 percent, and Malaysia was almost 90 percent.
Google’s recent internet economy report also showed that since 2015, Vietnam’s Internet economy had maintained a growth rate of up to 38 percent per year. By the end of 2019, experts forecasted Vietnam’s Internet economy would reach $12 billion, contributing five percent to the total Gross Domestic Products (GDP) of the country. This rate came from 61 million Internet users in Vietnam. Also, the average Vietnamese spent three hours and 12 minutes to use the Internet every day.
Not only proliferating, Vietnam had also risen to become the best ‘digitalised’ economy in the region with the substantial spread of e-commerce, notably the battle for market share of brands from domestically and internationally.
