Hong Leong Bank (HLB) has formed a partnership with Payments Network Malaysia (PayNet) to roll out its first ‘Project Cashless Kampung’ in Sekinchan, Selangor.
This project aims to push for financial inclusion by ensuring all 24,000 Sekinchan residents have access to full-fledged banking facilities and services.
The initial phase will see HLB facilitating the opening of bank accounts and debit cards issuance for the residents without them needing to visit a bank branch.
The partnership is also looking to empower 800 small business owners to digitalise their businesses through the acceptance of cashless and contactless payments.
In line with this, the bank will be equipping these businesses with an HLB DuitNow starter kit.
This includes a DuitNow QR for businesses to accept contactless QR payments from mobile banking apps and e-wallets, as well as the all-in-one payment terminal that accepts both card and QR payments.
The bank will first focus on “pasar”, hawker and flea market traders before equipping other local businesses in the area that are yet to be cashless enabled including schools.
Domenic Fuda, Group Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer of HLB said that this is in line with the bank’s ‘Digital at the Core’ strategy and ESG values to drive both digital and financial inclusion.
“Through this ‘Project Cashless Kampung’, HLB looks forward to empowering the business community across paddy and fruit farming to fisheries and tourism in capturing more opportunities to grow their business by accepting cashless payments, especially now as Malaysian consumers are increasingly preferring cashless and contactless.
We hope this will help further build Sekinchan’s thriving community and increase its popularity as a tourist destination offering cashless convenience for visitors,”
added Fuda.
Farhan Ahmad, Group Chief Executive Officer of PayNet said,
“Our Digital Payments Insights Study released earlier this year noted the urban-rural divide in cashless adoption still exists, with nearly two-thirds of Malaysians in non-urban areas still preferring cash to pay for daily expenses whereas only 36.2% in urban areas still pay cash for their daily spending.
‘Project Cashless Kampung’ is aimed at closing that gap by the adoption of cashless payments via DuitNow QR or with their MyDebit ATM cards. To optimize impact, we intend to take the key learnings and expand this Project to other non-urban areas.”
