In addition to online transport services, the Grab app will also enable users to pay for food and drinks, buy gadgets and make money transfers to friends
(L-R) Jason Thompson, Managing Director of GrabPay, and Sean Goh, Country Head of Grab Malaysia
Southeast Asia’s leading on-demand transportation and mobile payments platform, Grab, today announced that it has obtained regulatory approval from Malaysia’s central bank, Bank of Negara Malaysia, to offer GrabPay e-money services in the country.
To be launched in stages in the first half of 2018, GrabPay’s e-money services aims to help customers and merchants in emerging economies in Southeast Asia to go cashless and cardless.
In addition to online transport services, the Grab app will also enable users to pay for food and drinks, buy gadgets and make transfers to friends.
Jason Thompson, Managing Director of GrabPay, said: “Cash is still the most important payment method for many Malaysian SMEs and middle-class consumers, despite most adults having a deposit account. As one of the region’s most frequently used consumer apps with 72 million downloads, we are happy to work with Bank Negara to drive mass adoption of mobile payments in Malaysia and across Southeast Asia.”
Grab said it has taken a number of measures to ensure the privacy and security of transactions, including a six-digit PIN as a second factor authentication. Customers with a certain amount in their GrabPay e-money wallet account are required to activate the PIN. The Grab app will automatically prompt users to input their pin number when it detects any unusual activities.
“The enhanced GrabPay e-wallet will offer a lot of value to Malaysians. SMEs can tap into Grab’s large pool of consumers without the hefty burden of big advertising and marketing budgets. For our many Grab consumers, it means they can benefit from mobile payments without having to download a new app,” Sean Goh, Country Head, Grab Malaysia, added.
According to statistics by Bank Negara, cash handling and services cost RM 1.8 billion (US$440 million) a year to the banking industry and electronic-based payments may result in savings amounting to up to 1 per cent of a country’s economy due to lower retail payment cost versus cash transactions.
Also Read: Grab to begin trialling its merchant payment system in early November
In addition, Malaysia is poised to rapidly move towards a digital-first economy thanks to a combination of technological innovation and progressive policies, such as the Malaysian Financial Sector Blueprint 2011-2020 which aims to increase the number of electronic payments per capita to 200 by 2020.
In October, Grab halted credit top-up feature for its e-money service GrabPay, as the company is currently queuing in Bank Indonesia (BI) to secure its e-money operator license.
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