Bank of Kigali is set to reward the five best businesses that have consistently promoted cashless payments in the year 2020.

On Monday, the Bank recognized Simba Supermarket which tops the list with other four well-performing merchants to be rewarded throughout this week; namely Satguru Travel Agency, Vege Supermarket, Corner Supermarket and Kigali Butchery.

Dr. Diane Karusisi, Bank of Kigali’s CEO said that the bank seeks to celebrate the festive seasons with businesses that promoted digital payments throughout the year.

"We want all our clients to embrace a cashless economy,” she said, adding that digital payment systems are convenient and cheap for the bank and its clients.

"With the (digital) system, clients do not need to queue at the bank to withdraw money. The money is directly accessed by the use of payment cards from their accounts at any of the bank’s merchants’ locations, making the transactions instant and safe”.

She added that a cashless economy creates security for clients’ and merchants’ money.

"When transactions are done online, customer’s money remains in banks and the latter are liquid enough to provide cheap loans to clients” she explained.

Karusisi said that cashless payments have drastically increased during Covid-19 times.

"Digital payment transactions have increased to more than a half and they will keep increasing in the coming years,” she said.

She added that Bank of Kigali has so far issued over 2,500 POS machines to partnering businesses in order to facilitate cashless payments.

"We will continue providing more POS machines to all desiring merchants. These machines are free and they support all sorts of cards, either Bank of Kigali cards or other banks cards (both local and international cards) she added.

From the banking perspective, she explained, cashless payments are critical in boosting liquidity within the financial system.

Teklay Teame, the CEO of Simba Supermarket Ltd, said; "We are encouraging all our clients to use their cards while paying for goods.”

Through the BK POS machines, he explained, clients can use their debit and credit cards to pay for the goods.

"We are trying to discourage cash payments because it would also reduce the risks associated with Covid-19 spread. Every branch that we have recorded more than one million cashless transactions every day,” he said.