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New plans to revitalise post offices

M Abul Kalam Azad
In efforts to regain its lost glory, Bangladesh Post Office has launched a number of new services and plans to introduce some more.
Co-branding with Sonali Bank, which allows its 60,000 postal cash card holders to use the ATM booths of 26 banks for money transfer, is the latest. A deal to this effect was signed on July 6.
Apart from getting to use over 3,000 ATM booths across the country, the card holders can now buy goods from 8,000 shopping malls where Point of sale machines are available.
Since its launching in 2010, the uses of postal
FROM PAGE 1 cash card were limited to 1,332 out of 9,886 post offices in the country.
The card was introduced so people, especially those having no bank account, could transfer money at a low cost. Anyone can get the card forTk 45, and can withdraw or transfer up to Tk 5 lakh using the card at a costofTk5.
Sudhangshu Shekhar Bhadra, additional post master general (planning), said the authorities were planning to open 25 more cobranded ATM booths this year.
"About 1,200 cobranded booths will be set up at the premises of important post offices across the country within the next three years," he added.
Introduction of mobile banking is another one. This long-expected service, also called Post e-Pay, was introduced on December 16 last year to provide a range of financial services, including money transfer, bill payment, cash deposit and withdrawal.
The Post e-Pay was given a test run in three hubs of the capital — GPO, Banani and Sadarghat -- and at Chittagong GPO. It will be expanded all over the country once the BPO gains the capacity to handle the service to compete with some private banks and institutes that have already introduced the service.
The BPO earlier introduced Electronic Money Transfer Service (EMTS). Both the services have
yielded good results.
"So far, we have introduced Electronic Money Transfer Service at 2,700 post offices across the country. This service will be opened at all the 9,886 post offices by 2014," Bhadra told The Daily Star last month.
The BPO earned Tk 26 crore in commissions from the EMTS in 2012-13 fiscal year and Tk 28.23 crore and Tk 9 crore in the two previous years.
The post offices that looked deserted before the introduction of the EMTS are now witnessing long queues every day, said Bhadra.
Zakir Hossain Nur, deputy post master general, said that another service - mobile transaction notification -- will
open soon.
The BPO has some other ambitious plans. One of them is Conditional Cash Transfer (CCT), introduced under a pilot project funded by the World Bank.
Under the CCT, fund is being directly given to 14,127 underprivileged mothers in Narayanganj. Each mother gets Tk 840 every month through using her cash card on condition that she will send at least one of her children to school.
“This scheme has been successful and we are going to introduce it in other districts gradually," said Bhadra, adding that two more such payment systems — employment generation programme for the poorest (EGPP) and
reaching out to schoolgoing children (ROCS) -would be introduced soon.
The EGPP is going to be introduced in Dashmina of Patuakhali and Bhurungamari of Kurigram to pay people for their labour. Under the ROCS, school students will be given stipends to check dropouts.
"BPO's postal cash cards will be used in both the cases," said Bhadra, who believes BPO's bad days will be over in the coming years. "We have a target to issue 20-25 lakh cash cards by the end of this year."
However, the BPO will face a tough challenge as it will have to compete with the private sector, which is already much ahead in the race.