QR payments exploded in Argentina, driven by the interoperable system launched by the Central Bank in conjunction with fintech and banks almost two years ago to be able to pay with account-to-account money transfers.
Now, some players are demanding that the interoperability of the wallets go one step further and
that they also allow paying with credit cards.
According to data from the latest report on Retail Payments, prepared by the Central Bank,
payments with QR already represent 25% of the total transfers
made in the country.
In the last year, the number of operations has multiplied by five and 52 million operations have already been registered through the interoperable system.
These numbers, clarified the Central, include only
interoperable transfers
and not those that are made from a virtual wallet to a reader of a business of the same company.
Payments with transfers 3.0 are initiated by a QR code, which can be from a bank or fintech wallet, but
can only be made if the user has money in that account.
If, on the other hand, the user decides to pay with a credit card, he can only use it if the QR of the business is the same as the one he has in his wallet (Mercado Pago, Mode, etc.)
This has been the claim of some banks, which ask that interoperability be extended to plastics, to make the way Argentines pay more homogeneous and thus increase the adoption of digital payments in businesses.
Rafael Soto, CEO of Modo
, the "bank wallet" that already has 12 million downloads in the country, explained in a dialogue with
Clarín
: "We saw remarkable growth thanks to Transferencias 3.0, which guarantee the interoperability of account-to-account payments. account. What this system still lacks to become even stronger is that the QR of the competition also accept card payments".
For Soto, the current situation entails damages, both for the merchant and for his clients.
Among them,
"the confusion"
stands out : "This lies in the fact that
you cannot pay with all the wallets in all the payment methods
,
in all the QR
," he said and assured: "There are already international standards, designed by the brands of cards like Visa or Mastercard, for this to happen, but the ecosystem is not complying with this".
Soto remarked that the current state of the digital payments ecosystem "affects the decisions of customers and businesses."
Although the regulations that ordered the Transference 3.0 system do not contemplate payments with credit and do transfer money "account to account", Soto recalled: "There is a previous regulation, from 2018, which established that all QRs had to comply with certain standards for all types of operations. The brands also established rules regarding how QRs have to work and
none of that has been complied with yet
."
The truth is that, despite the claim of these players, the Central Bank remains, for now, on the sidelines of this initiative.
The next step of Transfers 3.0 will be the entry into force of a rule issued by the body chaired by Miguel Pesce that will allow customers who make payments with QR in stores to also
withdraw cash in those boxes
.
look also
The prices of imported products accelerate due to the obstacles and the gap of the dollar
Argentine bonds continue to fall on Wall Street and sink up to 3.5%