BPC Banking Technologies launches another national payment system based on SmartVista. Afghanistan Payments Systems (APS) is a consortium of financial institutions funded by Da Afghanistan Bank (standing as the Central Bank) through the World Bank, and is aimed to help in developing the retail banking market in Afghanistan by providing innovative electronic and mobile payment services.

“With cash being dominant in daily operations both by individuals and organizations in Afghanistan, lack of interoperable POS-terminals and ATMs networks has resulted in limited cards usage. This state initiative connects all the banks in one payment network which will bring transparency to the financial markets and raise confidence in payment services among citizens. BPC was chosen to partner Da Afghanistan Bank as a result of our expertise in greenfield deployment of national payment systems worldwide and our out of the box solutions functionality”, said Angelo Bertini, MD BPC Banking Technologies, MENA.

Since launch, SmartVista is the single processing platform to switch all transactions flows, to ensure comprehensive card products issuance and acquiring, to manage all ATMs and POS-terminals networks. SmartVista also provides APS with specific reporting facilities for further clearing and reconciliation supervision.

With four banks already integrated, the new payments network allows all the rest of the market to see business benefits, including operation cost reduction both to new technology platform and minimizing the cash flow, transparency of all operations, security and availability of payments. In the future, SmartVista will provide the scalability and flexibility for further switching of all utilities payments, e-wallets and mobile payments such as bill payment, e-top up and person-to-person transfers.

Mr. Khalil Sediq, The Governor of the Central Bank of Afghanistan said, “The current fragmented nature of financial services in Afghanistan has a huge impact on both the citizens and economy of the country. The state initiative under Da Afghanistan Bank resulting in the creation of a single platform and payments network creates seamless and transparent interaction of all banks in the country. Our aim is to provide the very best in functionality to consumers and industry, while building confidence and laying the foundations for a strong banking system and also integration to the wider global financial society. In BPC we found a partner to make this happen.”

“At APS, we view our partnership with BPC as a strategic step towards offering the Afghan market cutting-edge payment processing solutions,” said Zaheer Bawar, Managing Director of APS. “At APS, we are working relentlessly to ensure that we operate in accordance with the highest international standards for the industry. We believe the platform provided by BPC enables us to go to market faster and will also provide the financial industry in Afghanistan with access to high-quality services and state-of-the-art solutions.”