Multi-awarded challenger bank, Rizal Commercial Banking Corporation (RCBC), launched its nationwide campaign called RCBC Lahat Pwede QR Ph during a press conference in BGQ last 28 April 2023. The campaign aims to encourage more Filipinos to adopt digital payments by using the QR Ph code.
The event was attended by RCBC’s public and private sector partners and was led by RCBC’s Executive Vice President and Chief Innovation and Inclusion Officer, Lito Villanueva. Digital payments advocates, including Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) Deputy Governor for Payments and Currency Management Sector Mamerto Tangonan; Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) Assistant Secretary for Digital Philippines and E-Commerce Mary Jean Pacheco; Hapinoy President Mark Ruiz; and Growsari President Reymund Erwin Rollan also graced the occasion.
Aside from these esteemed guests, representatives from the small retailers and transport sectors, as well as social media key opinion leaders (KOLs) who are also entrepreneurs, were also in attendance. The RCBC Lahat Pwede QR Ph campaign hopes to raise awareness and promote the use of digital payments in the Philippines.
As an ardent collaborator of Bangko ng Sentral Pilipinas, RCBC actively supports the propagation of QR Ph, the standard QR code of the Philippines, based on the global EMV standard for secure payments. QR Ph facilitates secure fund transfers between customers of participating banks and non-bank electronic money issuers (EMIs), allowing them to transfer funds to other bank and e-money accounts easily and safely. The BSP introduced QR Ph in 2019 and expanded it during the COVID-19 pandemic as part of the government’s financial inclusion and digital payments strategy.
“RCBC is committed to help realize a financially-inclusive nation for all Filipinos through initiatives that support the government’s impact programs. The future is here-a digital forward, cash-lite, financially-inclusive society where we eliminate barriers to digital finance, lahat pwede,” said Villanueva.
In his keynote speech, BSP Deputy Governor Mamerto Tangonan discussed the common goals of the FinTech and banking sectors and shared BSP’s journey to accelerate digital banking in the Philippines. He also highlighted a recent survey that revealed a shift in Filipino consumers’ preference from cash to digital payments.
RCBC DiskarTech’s NegosyanTech users, composed of sari-sari store owners and tricycle drivers, also graced the event and shared the benefits of using the bank’s multi-awarded digital services.
In 2019, the BSP initiated the National Strategy for Financial Inclusion and Digital Payments Transformation Roadmap to bring more Filipinos into the formal banking system. In response to the BSP’s call, RCBC launched several initiatives, including the RCBC Digital mass affluent app, the RCBC DiskarTech app – the first Taglish and Cebuano financial inclusion app, and the ATM Go neighborhood ATM service. These initiatives have earned RCBC numerous awards, and have complemented the government’s financial inclusion programs, such as the PalengQR Ph Plus initiative, which seeks to onboard mSMEs, market vendors, and tricycle drivers into the interoperable QR Ph digital payments network. RCBC has also collaborated with Local Government Units (LGUs) to promote digital payments through QR Ph, as evidenced by the recent launch of the Iloilo City Pay and Bacolod City Pay QR Ph programs.