SINGAPORE: More than 500 food stalls at 44 hawker centres, coffee shops and industrial canteens have adopted a unified e-payments system, said Enterprise Singapore in a statement on Saturday (Jun 29).
The 10 hawker centres include Maxwell Food Centre, Chomp Chomp Food Centre and Zion Riverside Food Centre. The 22 coffee shops and 12 canteens are located across the island from Bukit Batok to Tampines. The full list can be found at http://www.epaysg.com.
The move, in line with the Government’s Smart Nation push, allows both merchants and customers in the food establishments to make cashless transactions.
READ: Hawkers want to embrace cashless payments but say they need help tackling barrier, a commentary
The stalls are currently able to accept a total of 23 payment schemes under one point-of-sales terminal.
(Image: Enterprise Singapore)
In September 2018, Enterprise Singapore, together with the Housing and Development Board, National Environment Agency and JTC Corporation, appointed payment provider NETS to get small food outlets to adopt the unified payment solution.
A pilot deployment of the e-payment initiative was carried out from December last year to end-May 2019. They found that the total value of e-transactions per stall grew at an average of 40 per cent per month, with the number of transactions increasing by nearly 30 per cent per month. On average, the value of each e-transaction was around S$6.
READ: Hawkers to receive same-day NETS sales proceeds
Mr Ted Tan, deputy CEO of Enterprise Singapore said that the response in the last six months has been encouraging and the scheme will be expanded to include more payment options such as Diners Club, Razer Pay and VIA by October.
“Adoption of e-payment is a first step towards the digital transformation of small food businesses in our heartlands and industrial estates,” said Mr Tan.
To further encourage the use of e-payments, incentives such as redeemable credits and cashback to consumers may be introduced, it said.
Merchants participating in the initiative receive one-to-one training and support to learn how to operate the point-of-sales terminal, the agency added.
“The unified e-payment model is interoperable, making available multiple payment options at one time, addressing the issue of limited food stall frontage space and facilitating the consolidation of transaction receipts,” said Enterprise Singapore.
“Through aggregation, businesses benefit from a lower merchant discount rate that is feasible for their cost structure and operations. The hassle of maintaining a daily cash float is also minimised.”
