Central Bank makes key improvements to payment systems

Sep 21, 2016 News

An efficient payment system is an essential component of Guyana’s financial stability. Taking this into account, the Central Bank of Guyana has been upgrading its payments system. It has done so in a number of ways, particularly through

Central Bank Head,
Dr. Gobind Ganga

the electronic clearing of cheques while making preparations for electronic funds transfer.
Central Bank Governor, Dr. Gobind Ganga, said that the entity continues to support the use of mobile money and other forms of cashless settlements.
In October 2015, Dr. Ganga said that the Bank introduced electronic clearing of cheques. He said that this has significantly improved cheque clearance with the clearing time for cheques reducing to one day for high value items, and two days for low value items.
To further improve the payment system, the Bank along with commercial banks, is engaged in discussions on the introduction of electronic funds transfer.
The Central Bank Governor said that this project is expected to be completed by April 2017. According to Dr. Ganga, it is envisaged that funds will move from the payer to the payee within the same day.
Furthermore, the Financial Sector Assessment Programme (FSAP) conducted last May recommended an upgrade of the National Payment System.
Consequently, the Bank of Guyana chief said that the Bank commenced discussions with the World Bank and International Monetary Fund (IMF) on payments system modernization.
He said that the areas to be covered in this project are payment system legislation to govern electronic transactions, development of a strategy to enable financial inclusion and the creation of financial infrastructure that meets international standards.
In the first half of this year, the Central Bank also noted in its mid-year report that the use of mobile money expanded with the number of mobile money accounts increasing by 38.8 percent from 12,816 to 17,794 as compared to 19.9 percent from 6,352 to 7,615 for the same period in 2015.
Also, the value of payments increased by 37.4 percent to $171.5 million from $124.8 million when compared to the same period in 2015 where there was a 20.2 percent increase from $76.4 million to $91.9 million. Dr. Ganga told Kaieteur News that this increase has not affected or had any noticeable implications on other payment means for the time being.
In addition, the report stated that the number of merchants accepting mobile money payments increased to 27.
According to the report, the Bank continues to provide settlement services for a switching system used to settle transactions across banks.
The value of transactions settled through the switch increased to $517 million at end-June 2016 from $451 million at end-June 2015.

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