Transfer of funds from e-zwich card to mobile money (MoMo) wallet is on a steady rise as the public is making good use of the second phase of mobile money interoperability service. The second phase of MoMo interoperability, which was launched in late November last year, was to enable the public to send money from their e-zwich card to their MoMo wallet and vice versa.
Figures from the Ghana Interbank Payment and Settlement Systems Ltd (GhIPSS), showed that in January this year alone, transfer of funds from e-zwich card to MoMo wallet, was done more than 9,000 times with values exceeding three million Ghana cedis. In this phase of the MoMo interoperability, it enables connectivity among the main payment platforms in Ghana comprising bank account, MoMo and e-zwich. Mr. Archie Hesse, Chief Executive of GhIPSS said the movement of funds across mobile networks as well as from e-zwich cards, clearly shows the relevance of the interoperability project.
He said the third phase, which will ensure interoperability at the agents’ level will further drive electronic payments in Ghana. Ghana has made steady progress toward electronic payments and a lot more is expected to take place this year, as GhIPSS rollout its projects for the year. Transfer of funds from e-zwich card to MoMo wallet until recently, could only be done at banking halls. But GhIPSS has begun upgrading the point of sales (PoSes) of e-zwich agents to enable them to also offer the transfer to MoMo wallet. A number of agents in Accra offer the service and officials of GhIPSS said they were moving to the regions to also upgrade their POSes.
Mr Hesse said the major breakthrough had made movement of funds seamless across the platforms and facilitating payments for businesses as well as individuals. The use of e-zwich to pay emoluments has gone up significantly as it has become an important tool to weed out ghost names from payrolls. Many people, therefore, receive their remunerations on the card and the interoperability means that funds received on the card, can be moved to their bank account as well as their MoMo wallet.