Revolutionising the cash card | Bangkok Post: tech

After a few years of quiet growth, TrueMoney hopes to tap into the growing trend for e-commerce and convenient bill payment for growth, while also launching an automated payment kiosk along with a few other high-technology solutions it already has up its sleeve.

Piyachart Ratanaprasartporn, general manager of True Money.

Piyachart Ratanaprasartporn, general manager of True Money, explained that the company currently offers five services. Payment services, e-Money, Touch Sim for offline near-field communications, TrueMoney cash card and ticketing services.

Most are self-explanatory, but the TrueMoney cash card is a bit different. It is a prepaid card for any number of services in the True group, including mobile phone top-ups and Wi-Fi hotspot access, as well as online games.

The mobile component uses Sim Toolkit technology. All TrueMove Sim cards have a True Money application pre-installed on them, which Piyachart says does make them a bit more expensive. But this also means that there are now over six million phone users out there capable of using TrueMoney in an encrypted, watertight solution. Only recently is he extending payments to the Internet though an SSL-encrypted website.

Adding money is as easy as pressing register, entering one's ID number and password and then walking into any 7-Eleven to add money. From then on, the money in the account can be used to pay mobile top-ups in TrueMove or pay any True group bill without any fees. Other fees outside the True conglomerate are charged at between 5 to 15 baht. Processing a payment costs one SMS.

Aside from the connected normal Sim, TrueMoney and TrueMove offer the Touch Sim. This is a MiFare (wireless) based smartcard integrated with a Sim Toolkit menu to offer more features and control than a contactless smartcard.

Auntie Anne's and Mr Donut now accept True TouchSim near-field payments but it is still a chicken-and-egg problem until more vendors accept it. Universities are one promising area, with Bangkok University now requiring a True Touch Sim for everything on campus, including class attendance. True helps and provides attendance reports for the teachers.

A lot of interest has also been from the Academy Fantasia TV talent show voting. One voter loaded up his Touch Sim with lots of money and touched his phone on the voting console 30,000 times to buy 30,000 votes.

Online shopping is another major focus for TrueMoney.

"Two years ago, the market was estimated at 60 billion baht. Last year, it was 80 billion and this year it is expected to make up about 100 billion. However, online payments only account for 20 percent. Eighty percent of purchases are still completed by the bank transfer and fax the payment slip model," he said.

Piyachart cited a Nectec survey that said most people are still scared of using a credit card online. This is where he hopes TrueMoney can play a major role. A buyer can make a purchase, load up an account and transfer the money immediately. If afterwards the account is compromised, unlike a credit card account, it poses no risk as it will not have any money lying in it.

TrueMoney partners with WeLoveShopping to provide escrow and reputation services. The money will be held in escrow until a received-safely notification is received from the buyer, or for 15 days. If there is a dispute, the money will be frozen.

Admittedly, the vast majority of TrueMoney's transactions are for topping up its TrueMove phone service. Second is for payments for online gaming, which already exceeds one billion baht a year, and third is the bill payment market. He said that the number for games is just for the game fees, not for electronic content within the games, which is separate.

TrueMoney is also launching a pilot TrueMoney Machine at Siam Square's Digital Gateway and at Fortune IT Mall. This fully automated machine can take cash and scan barcodes for bill payments, as well as link to all TrueMoney services without requiring staff. Piyachart said he got the idea from the security guard at his office who complained to him that it would be nice to be able to top up his phone with 10 baht credit a day instead of a big 50 baht credit. The machine can do that and more (and please the security guard at True Tower).

True Money has the most flexible class of licence from the Bank of Thailand - an e-Money licence for electronic money in any form (card or in a phone system). The BoT offers licenses for use in a specific group (such as a food court), under licence (where receipts can be issued on behalf of a third party) and the top class is without restrictions. He said that essentially, the only things that the BoT does not allow TrueMoney to do that banks can do are loans, interest paying accounts and foreign remittances.

Last year, True Money's total transaction volume was 28 billion baht.

Payments at point of payments have slowed down a little bit as of late and e-payments have increased. The recent protests have seen an increase as people go online to pay their bills, having to balance the extra costs of the bill payment fees against personal safety.

Piyachart hopes to upgrade 500 to 600 CP Freshmart mini-supermarket to provide a TrueMoney Express point.

Another venue is for agents to provide easier electronic top-ups via the phone in remote rural areas.

Today, when rural people top up, they often have to buy pre-paid top-up cards at higher-than face value. Fifty baht top-ups often retail for as much as 55 baht. By simplifying the top-up process so that handsets can be used as terminals, topping up will be made easier for all. Today they can pay 10 baht and get a 10 baht top-up and this creates more jobs too.

Piyachart says that the CP group may have over 10,000 branches of its own, but that is not enough to provide the level of service he wants. He wants to make that number tens of thousands this year. He mentioned a revenue share figure of 10 percent for his agents, which he said was "very generous".

True Money has around 6.5 to 7 million users. He wishes to get them to use the service more rather than increasing the number of users.

Remittance is not a big market in Thailand. Unlike other countries such as the Philippines or Kenya, banks are everywhere and most people have bank accounts.

"We talked to the GSM Association about this. In Kenya, they do not have the financial infrastructure and remittances are sent to relatives upcountry via trusted bus drivers. Now Kenya has implemented mobile transfers, which are more reliable and charges less," he said.

Asked about how he sees TrueMoney competing with the big players such as Paypal, iTunes, Google Checkout or Nokia's Ovi Pay, he said that TrueMoney will win through localisation.

All the others require a credit card account and often in US dollars. Many people might want to buy a 99c (32 baht) iTunes song but cannot. Piyachart himself has an iPad but cannot buy apps for it with his Thai-issued credit card as it says the iPad has not been officially launched in the country.

"I am talking with Apple. Paypal has talked to me, but nothing has been finalised yet," he said.

Finally, the General Manager of True Money said that he would like the Bank of Thailand to be more active in this area by offering a seal of approval to engender trust in the system.

Today, TrueMoney uses its own logo as a seal of approval to inspect verified websites and e-commerce partners, but without something international or from government, many people are still afraid of spending money online.