A key accelerator for usage of Transfiya has been the disbursement of government emergency coronavirus relief payouts to mobile wallets and bank accounts. Ninety percent of payments in Colombia are cash-based, a percentage that has hardly changed in the last 50 years. Prior to Transfiya, Colombians wanting to send money to customers of other banks had to use ACH transfers, which took several business days to arrive. Also, if they wanted to send money to another customer of their bank, they had to pay a fee. “The difference between a market like the U.K. and Colombia is that the U.K. has an existing payments infrastructure and protocols that the banks have agreed on and use,” said Domagoj Rozic, Minka’s CEO. “The big challenge in Colombia was to agree on what protocol to use for building a new real-time payments infrastructure. Once an agreement had been reached by Colombia’s entire financial ecosystem, Minka developed a protocol based on the blockchain and open banking, which is simple and fast to integrate.” Minka’s protocol acts as the common messaging standard for exchanging information about Transfiya payments between senders and recipients, and includes open banking APIs that integrate financial institutions to the real-time scheme. Transaction messages are sent instantly over a secure private layer, which Minka operates on top of the blockchain. Minka’s vision is to offer its protocol to banks and ACH operators across Latin America so they can build their own real-time payments networks, according to Rozic. Achieving interoperability with other instant payment systems such as Visa Direct is very important for Minka, Rozic said. “We’re open to integrating with different payment rails,” he said. ACH Colombia started working with Minka three years ago to develop the specifications for Transfiya. The service operates 24/7, providing free transfers of up to COP 250,000 ($65) per day to recipients' mobile phone numbers. So far, seven Colombian banks have signed up for Transfiya, including Davivienda, Itaú, Banco Caja Social, and Nequi (a digital-only bank owned by Bancolombia which has 3 million customers). Movii, an electronic money institution (SEDPE/Sociedad Especializada en Depósitos y Pagos Electrónicos) catering for unbanked and underbanked Colombians, and DaviPlata, a mobile wallet owned by Davivienda, also support Transfiya. “Our aim is to enlist all Colombia’s 40 financial institutions to support Transfiya, including wallet providers,” said Gustavo Vega, ACH Colombia’s president.

https://www.paymentssource.com/news/colombia-using-instant-payments-to-drive-financial-inclusion-amid-the-pandemic