S’pore Now Aiming For Cheque-Free by 2025 ‘Coz Cashless Society Mah

In case you haven’t caught up with the news scene in Singapore, just know that this week has been quite happening.

With the whole Shutterstock influencer saga, the new Milo Gao Kosong and KFC going straw-free, it’s rounding up to be quite an entertaining week.

So when yesterday (June 20), the Minister for Education Ong Ye Kung made an important announcement, we just had to tell you guys about it.

Cuz this affects us all.

Even if you don’t follow influencers, don’t drink Milo or don’t makan KFC.

Singapore is currently aiming to eliminate cheques by 2025 – that’s in seven years.

Mr Ong says that the nation has been working towards a more widespread use of electronic payment methods, and will continue to do so.

Think of apps like DBS Paylah, PayNow and online banking services that have gained a lot of traction in recent years. These are all part of the effort to switch over to e-payment methods.

Minister Ong was saying that they don’t want to force Singapore to be a cashless society. I for one am glad for this, because I will always belong to the minority that really enjoys using cash. 

They just want people to enjoy the convenience, safety and simplicity of e-payments and make that natural switch on their own.

How’s the progress of cashless society so far?

According to Minister Ong, currently 8 in 10 Singaporeans have already adopted e-payments and 3 in 5 local merchants accept e-payments.

Know how PayNow makes transferring money to your friends easy? Which means you got no more excuse to not pay them back right away for that KBBQ dinner?

Cuz you just put in your friend’s mobile number or NRIC/FIN number and the amount you want to transfer into the app and the money will automatically be put into their account.

And it will do so pretty much right away.

This app will now no longer just be kept to the small-scale, ‘peer-to-peer’ transfers anymore.

Because in order to encourage a cheque-free society, PayNow services will be going corporate.

From 13 August, businesses will be able to make use of PayNow services.

Business owners and the Singapore Government will be able to link their unique entity numbers to local bank accounts and transfer funds without needing to know account numbers via PayNow Corporate.

According to the director of the Association of Banks in Singapore (ABS), since PayNow became a thing in Singapore (about a year ago), more than a million people have used it and over $900 million have been transferred.

Which makes it a great platform for businesses and the government to adopt it into their day-to-day.

The same 7 banks will be involved in PayNow Corporate, btw – Citibank, DBS, HSBC, Maybank, OCBC Bank, Standard Chartered Bank and UOB.

This means that businesses can pay their employees and consumers via PayNow; the Government can do mass disbursements like Edusave money, CPF payouts and even GST rebate vouchers all via this platform!

And the money will be all deposited into accounts instantaneously, cutting out all the paperwork and waiting time (oh gosh, you’ve no idea how the paperwork and waiting time could balloon from a Net 30 to a Net Forever!).

Pilot Program

A pilot program testing out the disbursement of Edusave money to students’ accounts earlier this year was deemed successful, and so they are moving ahead with PayNow Corporate.

But of course, with all these e-payments, one has to wonder just how safe it is. I mean cyber crime has only been increasing in recent years.

Well, according to Minister Ong (who certainly came prepared for all these questions), the Monetary Authority of Singapore will be introducing a new bill later this year that specifically aims to protect people from crimes related to e-payments.

And to ensure our digital security as we move into this new financial-digital era.

According to Mr Rohit Joshi, the head of global liquidity and cash management at HSBC Singapore, this scheme that aims to completely cut out cheques by providing an alternative service, will be especially beneficial for one-off payments like insurance claims and casual labour wages.

Something to make insurance companies pay out faster? Wow, PayNow Corporate must be a magic wand, man.

Singaporeans on a popular forum page have been speculating that this sudden push into the financial-digital era might be because digital currency (for obvious reasons) are way more cost-friendly than actual paper currency.

It requires money and resources to print money, to print cheques, to print paperwork, to operate ATMs and so on. The switch to digital will certainly save the government a lot of money.

If this is true then you gotta wonder what they are doing with all these savings…cuz we still gonna get GST increase in a few years time…sian.

In any case, for those paper currency lovers (like me), fret not. There are currently no plans yet to completely eliminate paper currency.

So we can still keep our cash in our wallets and enjoy the convenience of e-payments for the more hassle-y parts of money like having to deposit cheques.

I think going cheque-free is a great move, personally, but I will admit that I hope we won’t go 100% digital anytime soon.

I will say this though, the day the cai png uncle starts doing PayWave is the day I will cry. 

Now you know what Singaporeans are talking about today; do check back tomorrow for another piece of news of the day!