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Overseas Remittance Now Possible at US$1 per Transaction
On Sept. 4, 2007, Sen. Miguel Zubiri, Chair of the Senate Committee on Cooperatives, and the National Confederation of Cooperatives (NATCCO) will unveil a nationwide payment systems to provide NATCCO members throughout the country convenient access to basic financial services.
The card-based system, which NATCCO says was built by Filipino developers, takes advantage of the ever-expanding mobile communication facilities in the country. Co-operatives under NATCCO will be able to dispense loans to its members. Members will be alerted through their mobile phones and will be able to claim their loans from participating cooperative branches upon presenting their cards. Members just have to send a text message to remit payments to NATCCO.
Sen. Zubiri particularly praised one of the unique features of the system, which allows NATCCO members with friends and families overseas to receive remittances at a cost of just US$1 per transaction.
The senator said that with re¬mittance transaction costs averag¬ing 13.5%, the NATCCO system has the potential to bring in an ad¬ditional US$1.6B to the local economy.
According to Zubiri, the average amount of overseas remittance is US$200. For this amount, US$27 is charged to send the remittance a far cry, he says, from the rate NATCCO is charging.
NATCCO Chairperson Wilfredo Dimamay describes the system as something the country should be proud of. The system was developed by Filipino IT professionals. It builds on the Filipino’s fascination with text messaging and it is a solution that also truly benefits many of our overseas Filipinos.
“The NATCCO initiative is in keeping with its mission of providing basic financial services to Filipinos, particularly those in the countryside,” explains NATCCO CEO Cresente Paez.
There is still a vast segment of the population needing access to credit and payment facilities,” he says. Sen. Zubiri and NATCCO officials are optimistic that the system will spur micro-finance and micro-commerce and will generate the success similar to that achieved in Bangladesh by Nobel Peace Prize winner Muhammad Yunnus and the Grameen Bank.
This is about the big picture,” says Sen. Zubiri, “It’s about serving the Filipinos in the fields - those who have little or no access to basic financial services. Bangladesh did something to serve their underserved citizens. NATCCO is doing the same thing but in the Filipino fashion.”