$32 Billion Worth of Transactions in 1 Month

EghtesadOnline: Shaparak, the payment settlement network and watchdog affiliated with the Central Bank of Iran, processed more than 1.44 billion transactions worth 1.53 quadrillion rials ($32.7 billion) in the 10th Iranian month ending Jan. 20.

News ID: ۷۸۱۷۹۹

18 February 2018

The figures indicate a respective increase of 0.39% and 2.12% in the number and value of transactions compared to the previous month, the report published on Shaparak’s website shows.

As against the same month of last year when the number and value of transactions stood at 1.08 billion and 1.25 quadrillion rials ($26.74 billion), the numbers indicate a respective hike of 33.03% and 22.21%.

Shaparak reports that instruments of receiving Internet and mobile payments respectively grew by 2.16% and 16.78% in terms of numbers during the 10th month. As the number of POS devices in shops across the country rose by 1.24%, the total number of payment instruments indicated a 2.29% increase, according to Financial Tribune.

Internet and mobile payment receiving methods had a respective market share of 8.66% and 7.14% during the month, with POS devices still boasting a predominant share at 84.21%. Compared with the previous month, mobile instruments increased their share from 6.25% and took almost all of it from the share of POS devices.

The total number of active payment receiving instruments was registered at more than 7.77 million by Shaparak.

The report indicates that in terms of numbers, transactions aimed at purchasing products and services grabbed the biggest share at 77.98% while transactions conducted for paying public utility bills and purchasing phone recharges, and transactions done with the goal of checking account balance had a respective share of 15.23% and 6.78%.

In terms of value, transactions for purchasing goods and services had a 95.53% share while those aimed at paying bills and buying phone recharges had a 4.47% share.

According to Shaparak, more than 1.44 billion or 88.49% of all transactions processed in the 10th month of the current year were successful.

In analyzing faulty transactions, the entity reports that errors on the receiving end, i.e. the company offering payment services, accounted for only 0.1% of all transactions, showing a 16.96% decrease compared with the previous month.

Errors on the sending end, i.e. errors emanating from the bank sending the transaction or the Shetab interbank system, accounted for 2.67% of all transactions to indicate an increase of 171.02% compared with the previous month.

User errors accounted for a majority of faulty transactions and, with an 8.67% share of all transactions, showed a 5.14% rise.

Shaparak also monitors the number of active bank cards and divides them into three categories of debit cards, gift cards and prepaid cards.

A total of more than 88.47 million cards used for transactions were active in Iran during the 10th month, while more than 85.69 million or 96.86% of them were debit cards. Gift cards had a 3.06% share at more than 2.7 million and prepaid cards had a 0.08% share at 72,891.

When compared with the previous month when a total of more than 83.49 million cards had active transactions, the number of active bank cards in the 10th month indicates a 5.96% increase. That is while debit cards had the highest monthly rise at 6.55% while the number of gift cards and prepaid cards respectively contracted by 9.95% and increased by 0.73%.

Bank Melli Iran, the nation’s biggest bank, boasted the lion’s share of active bank cards with transactions at 22.07% while Bank Saderat and Bank Mellat came second and third with 11.81% and 11.80% shares respectively.

During the 10th month, Bank Melli had the highest number of gift cards with a 22.42% share while Bank Mellat had the highest number of debit cards with a 46.38% share.