KUALA LUMPUR: Malayan Banking Bhd (Maybank) is targeting to enable over 10,000 device acceptance points or garnering RM350 million worth of payment card transactions within the next 12 months via its latest mobile payment app for merchants Tap2Phone.
This will be on top of its current card transactions, averaging at RM60 billion a year, according to Maybank head of community financial services Malaysia Datuk Hamirullah Boorhan.
Tap2Phone is a fintech payment solution catered to small businesses, as well as delivery and sales agent. This new service, which is the first in Southeast Asia, enables merchants to accept card payments from customers by using the app on their mobile phones without the need for a point-of-sale terminal.
Tap2Phone is supported by the latest Android-based smartphones equipped with Near-Field Communication and Trusted Execution Environment technologies to facilitate credit, debit and prepaid card payments.
For a minimum monthly fee of RM5, merchants can download and launch the Tap2Phone app on their smartphones and customers can then tap their card to the merchant’s phone to make payments. The Tap2Phone service accepts all contactless payments for transactions of RM250 and below.
Hamirullah said the Tap2Phone service allows merchants to provide seamless and instantaneous payment options for their customers through a secure and easy-to-use mobile payment technology.
“We believe this new service will help increase the use of cashless payments technology by businesses which would further lower the infrastructure cost for merchants and support the growing demand of electronic payments in the country.”
Visa country manager (Malaysia) Ng Kong Boon said there are 40 million credit, debit and prepaid cards in Malaysia, of which 95% are NFC (contactless)-enabled.
“There are currently six million transactions of contactless payments per month in Malaysia, which represents 35% of contactless payment penetration, compared with less than 5% two years ago. Malaysia is one of the top five countries in terms of contactless payment card penetration in Asia Pacific,” said Ng.
He sees huge opportunities for cash displacement amongst small businesses and merchants. Contactless transactions in Malaysia are becoming increasingly popular, with four out of 10 Visa transactions being contactless.
Tap2Phone will be fully rolled out in September 2019 and is powered by Soft Space.
