Banks are currently undergoing certification to enable the ATM cards of their customers to work on the new and hybrid Point Of Sale devices, officials of the Ghana Interbank Payment and Settlement Systems (GhIPSS) have said.

The process to be completed soon would allow customers of the certified banks to soon enjoy the new initiative.

Banks are required to go through the certification process before the ATM cards can work on the POSes and some have reportedly completed the process already.

The hybrid POS, which accepts both e-zwich and normal ATM cards, implies that bank customers will be able to shop directly using their cards instead of cash.

Officials of the Ghana Interbank Payment and Settlement Systems (GhIPSS) say a two-week pilot testing of Purchase Transactions on the hybrid POS has been completed successfully, paving the way for some POSes to be deployed at a few shopping outlets in Accra.

The few POSes will be monitored for a short period before a significant number is added.

The hybrid POS was introduced by GhIPSS to enable bank customers with the normal ATM cards to be able to shop directly with their cards, instead of going to the ATM outlet to withdraw cash before returning to shop.

The hybrid POS will accept e-zwich and local ATM cards for a start while Visa and MasterCard branded ones will be accepted at a later date.

The hybrid POS is the latest service to be facilitated by the national electronic payment platform christened gh-link. The gh-link platform which has interconnected the banks has also made it possible for bank customers to use the ATM of other banks.

Over 25 banks with close to one thousand ATMs are on gh-link making it the widest ATM payment platform.

The gh-link platform has made international platforms less attractive with reports indicating that a number of banks intend to issue more of the local cards, since it gave more access and convenience to their customers.

Data released by GhIPSS showed that over 13,000 transactions on the average occurs every week on the ATMs of banks other than the customers’ own bank, showing more bank customers were using the nearest ATM instead of going round to look for their bank’s ATM.

GhIPSS had earlier announced that over 300 hybrid POSes would be deployed next month and with banks completing their certification process, all looks set for the Ghanaian economy to begin to see more use of cards to pay for transactions, a situation that would lead to cash-lite, a term used to describe economies where more electronic cards and less cash is used as payment.