Executives from the State Bank of Vietnam’s HCM City branch, Sacombank and the first three companies to go live with Tap to Phone at a ceremony to launch the service in HCM City on November 27. — Photo courtesy of Sacombank

HCM CITY— Sacombank has partnered with Visa, the global leader in payments technology, to deploy the ‘Tap to Phone’ technology that enables merchants to use their mobile phones or tablets as a point of sale device for contactless payments without the need for additional devices or peripherals for the first time in Việt Nam.

Together with the Rapid Seller Onboarding solution, enterprises/ household businesses can complete the setup and register online to become a card accepting unit quickly and easily.

Tap to Phone technology uses software development kit (SDK) integrated in mMerchant, a mobile app exclusively meant for merchants, to meet the increasing demand for fast and convenient payment solutions.

Tap to Phone is now used only in near-field communication (NFC)-enabled Android mobile devices, but will be expanded to iOS devices in the near future.

This solution will meet the requirement for cost-effective contactless payment solutions among merchants/enterprises, especially those needing multiple mobile payment points such as insurance companies, cash-on-delivery shipping providers, restaurants getting paid at the table, and small businesses, and allows more merchants to accept cards without having to install a card terminal or adding payment accessories while ensuring safe and secure transactions.

With this simple operation, sellers can quickly and easily receive payments anytime, anywhere.

After entering the amount, buyers just need to tap their Visa contactless cards on the seller's mobile device to complete the transaction.

Cardholders don’t need to sign an invoice if it is under VNĐ1 million (US$43.2). For invoices worth over VNĐ1 million, the sellers will instruct cardholders to sign their names on their mobile device screen and enter an email address to receive the e-invoice.

Dai-ichi Life Vietnam, Prudential Vietnam and Tiki Corporation are the bank’s first partners to deploy this modern technology.

Speaking at the inaugural ceremony on November 27 in HCM City, Nguyễn Minh Tâm, deputy CEO of Sacombank, said: “The co-operation between Sacombank and Visa has made Việt Nam the first country in the world to adopt an absolutely automatic and closed process that enables a merchant to securely accept contactless card payments.

“With the strength in retail banking activities along with a rich customer base from businesses in the insurance and e-commerce sectors to small and medium enterprises and household businesses, this solution will help Sacombank' s existing and potential customers increase sales, save operating costs and contribute to promoting non-cash payments, bringing benefits to the economy.”

A study by Visa in 2020 found that Việt Nam has seen a surge in mobile wallet and payment app usage in recent years, with over 85 per cent of consumers owning at least one mobile wallet or payment app, and over 40 per cent using mobile contactless payments.

It has 129.5 million mobile phone subscribers, more than half of them using 3G and 4G, showing strong demand for digital payment solutions.

On the same day the bank in collaboration with Visa launched the NFC mobile contactless payment service for customers using its Sacombank Pay app on Android mobile phones.

The service allows consumers to use their mobile devices to make contactless transactions on NFC POS devices or Tap to Phone mobile devices instead of using their cards. — VNS