Sterling Bank Plc has launched a product called ‘OnePay for Business’, a mobile app that empowers merchants to use their mobile phones as Point-of-Sales systems.
The bank said it allows merchants and their customers to receive and make cardless, contactless and cashless payment for goods and services in a near-cash form using QR code, bluetooth and PaywithSpecta.
Introducing OnePay for Business in Lagos, the Group Head, Digital Banking, Sterling Bank, Dipo Alabede, said it met the need for a hygienic payment method in a COVID-19 world.
He said, “The contactless payment feature on the app is essential for merchants and customers because it keeps both safe as the world combats the coronavirus pandemic. It is also an effortless way to make payments.”
According to Alabede, the product was easy to use and available for download on the Android Play Store and iOS Store.
He said it required a smartphone with an Internet connection to set up.
“After setting up, customers can log in to use payment options that include QR code, nearby payment (bluetooth) and PaywithSpecta,” he said.
Explaining, he said a QR code is a unique barcode containing the merchant’s business name, QR merchant ID, and other information encoded into it. Instead of manually entering data into their mobile phones, customers would scan a merchant’s QR code using the QR feature on their app to start the payment process.
Alabede explained that customers could make payment using the app’s QR feature if it was enabled as a part of their mobile banking offerings.
“To pay merchants, customers have to open their OneBank app or any other bank mobile app to select the QR service option, validate and complete the transaction,” he said.
He identified being able to make payments anytime and anywhere, even without a wallet or sufficient cash at hand, as one of the benefits of using the Sterling QR service.
Merchants could also accept payments anytime and anywhere by using the mobile app, he said.
Urging merchants to download and use the app, the Executive Director, Commercial Banking at Sterling Bank, Tunde Adeola, noted that it would save them money and reduce their cost of operations.
The Chief Digital Officer of the bank, Olayinka Oni, described the product as another means of enriching lives through immediate settlement value for merchants.
Oni said Sterling Bank was prepared to do business with credible partners and happy to partner with the NIBSS on the project.
-Reuters