Although the potential is huge, experts still believe that there must be more positive measures to promote payment via QR Code.
Just one to two years ago, there were a number of people who could hardly imagine that one day they would just need to take a smartphone to the road to be able to do everything, from booking a car, eating, buying a flight ticket, going to the supermarket, buying a book, etc. without carrying a purse, or a bank card. “Spending money without wallet” is no longer strange.
In the first quarter of 2020, sales of payment via QR code of VNPay-QR increased by 550 percent compared to the same period in 2019. In the period of May 5, 2020 after removing social seperation, the payment revenue of VNPay-QR still grew by 150%. In just one year, the number of payment points accepted by VNPay-QR has jumped from 20,000 to over 70,000 points, VNPay-QR has connected 33 banks and seven e-wallets.
This information was shared by Ngo Anh Tuan, VNPay-QR Sales director. This positive growth is also easy to understand when the coverage of payment point soars such as restaurants, bars, cafes, milk tea, supermarkets, convenience stores, and clothing stores.
Launched in Japan since 1994, QR Code 2D code has been widely used in the world in many different fields such as goods labels, information listing, advertising applications, information cards and growing through payment activities as an intermediary connecting information between businesses and customers. Simply with a QR scanner software installed on the smartphone, customers can access encrypted information via QR Code.
The application from QR Code is increasingly expanding in the Vietnamese market, not only with payment transactions, but also to withdraw money at ATM without using a card. For example, at Vietnam Joint Stock Commercial Bank for Industry and Trade (Vietinbank), from June 2020, this bank has officially implemented the quick withdrawal function by QR code at ATM on iPay Mobile application for debit cardholders. A series of other banks such as Joint Stock Commercial Bank for Foreign Trade of Vietnam (Vietcombank), Sai Gon Thuong Tin Commercial Joint Stock Bank (Sacombank), Joint Stock Commercial Bank for Investment and Development of Vietnam (BIDV), and Tien Phong Commercial Joint Stock Bank (TPBank) all have launched this feature.
The fact that a series of banks have introduced the ability to quickly withdraw money via QR codes at ATMs via mobile banking applications is recognised as one of the important steps in the process of digital transformation of banks in Vietnam.
Digitising banks also means reducing time, procedure and costs. Talking to reporters, an expert said that even from the addition of QR Code payment feature to the current Mobile Banking system, both businesses and banks had cut many costs.
Accordingly, the banks reduced the investment costs for ATM and POS, and also increased the possibility of expanding the network of customers using payment services. On the side of sellers, also known as merchants, would save investment costs for cashier operations. Enterprises have many business locations, each QR code would be issued to make it easier to manage revenue and expenditure.
Another important point is that when experiencing payment via QR Code, customers realise the convenience of not having to worry about change, to carry cards, and the prevention of revealing card information at the shops. Customers are the ones who directly enter and confirm the amount to be paid on their mobile phones instead of the store clerk swiping the card via POS and enter the payment amount, so experts think this is an advantage of minimising the risk of discrepancies on the payment to customers. QR codes also have two layers of security and special format of the code, according to EMVCo global standards, so the security of payment transactions will be more secure.
VietinBank deputy general director, Tran Cong Quynh Lan, said that QR Code was a link in the process of building a mobile payment ecosystem. In fact, the shift from internet banking to mobile banking is increasingly paid attention by banks, to bring banking products and services closer to customers. Transfers, savings deposits, loan repayments, payment of electricity, water, and telecommunication bills are all conveniently carried out via mobile banking.
In addition, Lan realised that in order to gain access to a diverse ecosystem, banks actively cooperated with organisations and businesses to provide banking services at all levels. Such as being able to provide APIs so that third-party mobile applications could integrate and carry out payment procedures for the services provided. And mobile applications of banks and service providers such as health, education, transportation, and consumption could connect, interconnect each other to form an ecosystem, providing customers with the most convenient needs.
