Sunday, November 28 2010 03:23

Many Armenians are still doubtful of the advantages of plastic cards


ArmInfo. The holders of bank cards in Armenia cash 60,000 AMD ($180) per card a month and pay just 5,000 AMD ($14) non-cash for goods and services.

Even though the total amount of cash-out and POS-terminal transactions grew by 35% as compared with late Q3 2009, the amount of per card transactions did not change.

The press service of the Central Bank of Armenia reports that this shows that the market is not developing and cards are issued mostly under corporate wage or consumer lending projects. The key factors preventing active use of plastic cards are poorly developed infrastructure, big percentage of shady transactions in retail trade, lack of plastic card culture. Emitters conduct very weak PR policies while people doubt that card accounts are safe.

In order to improve the situation, local banks should appear with innovative projects beyond the Armenian Card system, large banks should create their own processing centers while the government should limit the cash flow.
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