Daily Times

As a means of speeding up the country’s retail payment digitalization, Pakistan’s State Bank of Pakistan has set QR code payment standards. These requirements must be completed before QR codes may be issued and payments can be accepted through them. The SBP’s goal is to promote the inclusivity, innovation, and modernisation of the country’s payment systems through this effort. Dr. Reza Baqir, Governor State Bank of Pakistan, made the announcement while chairing the 5th Stakeholders consultation meeting on Digital Financial Services in August 2021. The development and issuing of a single QR code was previously announced. Among the countries that have taken comparable initiatives to promote low-cost digitisation of payment services, particularly at the retail level, Pakistan has now issued a single countrywide QR code standard.

Low-cost and easy-to-use QR Code-based mobile payments have become more popular around the world. Pakistani financial institutions are issuing QR codes that don’t meet industry standards and have limited interoperability, which has resulted in a lack of adoption and use of the technology in the country. EMVCo’s QR Code Specifications for merchant payments are the basis for the common QR code standards produced by an industry consultation group founded by SBP. EMV specifications and related testing processes are managed and developed by EMVCo, a global technical organisation that promotes safe payment transactions around the world. New and creative use-cases will be able to make use of the Standards’ flexibility because data items have been reserved in advance.

For QR code-based payments to be issued and adopted, SBP has released two versions: one for person-to-person transfers and the other for transfers between individuals and merchants. P2P is a standard that banks and financial institutions use to produce QR codes for their customers so that they can collect payments on their mobile apps. In a manner comparable to the acceptance of card-based payments, the Person to Merchant standard would be applied to the acceptance and processing of merchant-based payments via mobile apps. By the 30th of June 2022, all financial institutions in Pakistan offering digital payment services must ensure that their mobile apps are capable of scanning and processing any QR code provided in accordance with the new standard.

Standards also encourage domestic payment schemes, which will give Pakistanis an efficient and cost-effective payment alternative. As a result, customers can choose from a wide variety of payment options by using a single QR code that contains embedded information about numerous payment systems. This will reduce or eliminate the amount of QR Codes at merchant sites. Moreover, SBP has just launched the P2P version of their quick payment system, Raast, which provides a completely interoperable payment mechanism for QR-based payments. State Bank hopes that by issuing the standard QR code rules, it would make low-cost digital payment acceptance points (i.e. QR Codes) more widely available and more widely used across the country. For everyday transactions like grocery shopping, school fees, bill payments, online shopping, and ride-hailing, the new QR Code standard would make it easier for customers to pay or accept digital money. It would also allow for P2P Financial transfers (fund transfers between persons).