NEPALPAY QR Announced as an Implementing Infrastructure of NepalQR

NEPALPAY QR, as an implementing infrastructure of NepalQR, is now operational that went live recently with a few of the BFIs and PSPs.

NCHL made an official announcement in this regard at a joint Press Meet organized today (11th of March, 2022). The event was organized in the presence of Ashoke SJB Rana, CEO of Himalayan Bank Ltd., Nischal Raj Pandey, CEO of Sanima Bank Ltd., Bishal Sigdel, Chief Strategy Officer of NIC Asia Bank Ltd., Ghanshyam Dhungel, Chief Business Officer of Kamana Sewa Bikash Bank Ltd., Bind Raj Paudel, Chief Manager of Samriddhi Finance Company Ltd., Pranaya Rajbhandari, CEO of Focusone Payment Solutions Pvt. Ltd. and Neelesh Man Singh Pradhan, CEO of NCHL along with the other officials and various media representatives.

About NEPALPAY QR

NEPALPAY QR has been implemented by NCHL as part of the National Payment Switch which complies with the NepalQR standards published by Nepal Rastra Bank.

It works as an independent QR scheme and allows QR interoperability at the merchant level and network level. The infrastructure is expected to support and accelerate the current growth of QR transactions in Nepal.

The representatives from various banks PSPs and NCHL during the Press Meet pledged to further emphasize and promote QR-based transactions. The mobile banking applications of Himalayan Bank Ltd (HI-MB), Sanima Bank Ltd. (Sajilo e-banking), Samriddhi Finance Ltd., and connectIPS mobile app have been enabled to scan and pay with NEPALPAY QR.

Currently, it will directly benefit a total of 1.4 million mobile banking users of HBL, SANIMA, and Samriddhi Finance and bank users of connectIPS.

Similarly, Himalayan Bank Ltd., NIC Asia Bank, Kamana Sewa Bikash Bank, Samriddhi Finance, and Focusone Solutions have also started to acquire merchants for NEPALPAY QR.

Himalayan Bank and Focusone have implemented merchant-level interoperability such that a single QR can be scanned for payment through multiple networks of VISA Union Pay, AliPay and NEPALPAY. Within a week time of its rollout, the respective BFIs and the PSP have already acquired close to 5,000 merchants.

NEPALPAY QR has also been added as an option within payment gateway of NCHL provided to the
Government of Nepal, such that the general public will now be able to scan QR from their mobile banking app, wallets, and connectIPS app to initiate revenue payment to the GoN.

For that, they can simply scan the QR code to make payments and choose to pay from the three options available:

• Mobile banking
• Wallets/PSPs
• connectIPS

About NCHL

NCHL has been facilitating the member BFIs, PSPs, and PSOs for rollout and adoption of various instruments and use cases of National Payment Switch. Under this journey, it has recently completed Phase I of National Payment Switch (NPS) related to non-card-based retail payments.

For card-based payments, MOCO digital wallet has already collaborated with the banks like Himalayan Bank Limited where you can make payments through cards using your mobile banking apps.

40 BFls and 6 PSPs have already subscribed for the implementation of the National Payment Switch, while others are also in the process of onboarding and required testing. Other instruments and use cases that have been rolled out through NPS include virtual payment address-based fund transfer (NEPALPAY Instant), request to pay as a debt instrument (NEPALPAY Request), Account Tokenization, Biller Gateway for interoperability, Wallet to wallet transfers, and PO settlements of service payments.

Also read: NEPALPAY Instant is Live in connectIPS: Facilitates Interoperable Transfers & Settlements in Real-Time