The Ghana Interbank Payment and Settlement Systems, GHIPSS says it has deployed adequate channels to enable national service personnel access their allowances via E-zwich at a lower cost without hassle.  This is coming as GHIPSS prepares to pay all service personnel across the country via its E-zwich platform from this month.

The decision to use the E-zwich as the mode of payment for national service personnel was taken in November last year as part of efforts to eliminate the incidence of payroll fraud while ensuring that the personnel received their allowances instantly by the press of a button.           

The Business Development Manager at GHIPSS, Mary Dei-Sarpong says other arrangements have been made to make it easier and less-costly for the personnel to access their funds.                                                                                  

“We are deploying a lot of hybrid Point of Sale (PoS) terminals which can take both E-zwich and local ATM cards. We are also supplying some PoS terminals to the National Service district offices so the NSS personnel can access service, they can at least load funds in there. They are not going to be charged loading fees.  Currently, we have about 33 E-zwich-only ATMs available and about 16 Hybrid ATMs that can take both E-zwich and local cards mainly with Ecobank and we’re working to ensure GCB, GT Bank and Cal Bank come on board soon” she noted.

GHIPSS has also revealed none of its services attracts the 17.5 percent VAT on fee-based financial services. 

Madam Dei-Sarpong added, her outfit has instituted additional measures to complement the bio-metric feature of the E-zwich system in fighting this canker of ghost-names that has bedeviled the disbursement of national service funds over the years.

 “The E-zwich card is a biometric card and so you cannot send somebody to take your money for you. You have to come yourself, verify before you can have access to your money. We are working closely with the National Service to ensure the names match the correct numbers before they are cleared for payment. We are working to ensure there are no ghost names before we pay” she concluded.