eTransact

A NEW electronic transaction technology , eTransact has been introduced on the Ghanaian market to augment Bank of Ghana’s e-Zwich which aims at improving the payment system.
The Head of Sale & Marketing for eTransact Ghana Limited, Mr Samuel Asare, at a press briefing said that the technology was basically an endorsement of e-Zwich in its efforts at promoting e-commerce in Ghana.
The system, he disclosed had been tried and tested in a number of countries where they were currently in operation.
“It is in operation in the United Kingdom, South Africa, Nigeria, Zimbabwe and now in Ghana and Sierra Leone” he stated, adding that it could be used for transaction including the payment of school fees, utility bills and a whole lot of other transactions.
He said presently eTransact was among the few financial services in Ghana where transactions could be done using the Internet and they were looking forward to establish a continental payment system between all the countries where the system was in operation.
“At the moment we have four banks signed onto this platform and they are UBA, Zenith Bank, and Amalgamated Bank where our services are live and operational, including two other banks, GT Bank and Unibank where these services are in the process of implementation” he stated.
The Head of Operations, Mr George Babafemi said their services did not intend to compete with the services provided by Bank of Ghana’s e-Zwich but rather to complement and contribute to the expansion of a cashless society in Ghana.
“We intend to contribute our quota by making cash handling more easier for the banking and non-banking population”, he noted.
Mr Babafemi hinted that a clear area of handling that challenge could be attributed to the multi-channel switch transaction between card holders, banks and merchants through various channels of transactions.
Some of the channels include mobile phones, the Internet, bank outlets, point of sale devices and Automated Teller Machines (ATMs) as alternate channels of making payment through the services.
The services he stated was connected to all the communication networks in Ghana and one did not necessarily need a bank account to operate the system but a pin code on a re-loadabel eTransact smart card which would enable a customer to re-load his or her card from any of the banks where the services are in operation.
He encouraged all small and medium-scale businesses and those involved in micro-credit transactions to take advantage of this new platform to be linked to the financial system so as to benefit from the various services that the financial sector could offer.