GCash doubles account users to 4million
There are four million GCash users to date, more than double the figure a year ago. On average, some P6 billion pesos worth of transactions are made per month.
These are all impressive numbers—figures that prove Filipinos are increasingly being at ease with using electronic money for their everyday needs.
GCash, a prepaid money connected to a mobile phone, is a card-first technology that provides financial services, especially to the underserved and the underbanked.
GCash is a member of BancNet as an EMI or electronic money issuer. As such, users with the GCash Mastercard physical card can withdraw cash at any BancNet ATMs. They can, of course, use the account to purchase items online (where Mastercard is accepted), as well as pay for products/services offline at POS terminals.
“Telco (telecommunications company) is here, it has penetration. It’s about combining the power of financial technology and the ubiquity of mobile telco so we could bring about services that make the lives of our countrymen much easier,” said Albert Tinio, president and CEO of G-Xchange Inc, the com- pany that runs GCash.
Three out of four Filipinos don’t yet have bank accounts and only around five percent have credit cards. This gap in the financial services is the market that fintech companies would like to tap, until these individuals eventually get their own credit line, leading to ac- cess to more financial services.
Tinio stressed that they are not a bank (they complement banks, instead), but users can link their mobile banking account (BPI and RCBC at the moment) with GCash, allowing individuals to transfer funds between the two.
Aside from the GCash Mastercard, there’s also the GCash Beep card, which lets people ride the MRT and select buses in the metro without having to buy single-journey tickets. The GCash Beep card can also be used to purchase items at FamilyMart convenience store.
To load money into GCash, users need only to go to loading establishments. Alternatively, they can link their GCash accounts to partner banks’ mobile banking account so that they can top up value through the GCash app.
GCash recently launched the Makatizen Card, a valid government ID and a payment card for the city of Makati. With this, select residents would be able to transact with and avail the services of the city government without the use of physical cash. They would be able to use these cards to pay fees and taxes, as well as for personal remittances and other financial transactions. City government employees, on the other hand, can use their Makatizen Card to receive salaries and allowances.
He said: “Our goal is to increase the number of monthly active users. With the Filipinos’ familiarity with ‘loading’ their mobile phones and our continued campaign to educate them of the benefits of cashless payment, this should be easily attainable.”