Digital drive: Revenues to be collected via mobile phones

Business Tuesday 22/October/2019 20:57 PM
By: Times News Service
Digital drive: Revenues to be collected via mobile phones

Muscat: The Ministry of Finance intends to pave the way for some government agencies to collect revenues via mobile phone.

According to officials, the move aims to make the collection process easier and more secure in terms of confidentiality.

The Ministry of Finance, in cooperation with the Central Bank of Oman (CBO), organized a workshop on the collection of government revenues.

Musallam bin Mohad bin Ali Kotton, Director General of Income at the Ministry of Finance said: “The seminar is part of the drive towards e-government. As directed by the Ministry of Finance, all government agencies will completely stop collecting revenue in cash and go to comprehensive automatic collection from the beginning of 2020.”

He added: “The collection of government revenues via mobile phone will make it easier for the beneficiary to obtain the service and give him an additional option to the current payment services.”

He confirmed that the collection of revenues via mobile phone will be launched in some government agencies in November 18 and will be fully implemented by all during 2020.

The new service will facilitate and simplify the procedures of obtaining the required service while ensuring the confidentiality of information. He also stressed that users of electronic payment methods will not be charged any extra due to the use of those means.

Ali Al-Jabri, Head of the Payment Systems Department at the Central Bank of Oman, gave a presentation on the mobile payment clearing system, in which he discussed the bank's strategy and its role in developing the national payment systems.

He confirmed that the CBO is currently working to strengthen the mobile payment clearing system to be a national platform and to provide both infrastructure and innovative services to all parties in the Sultanate.
These services will be available in mobile banking applications and e-wallets as of November 18, 2019.

He also pointed out that banks and payment service providers will provide e-wallets as one of the options and products in mobile payment services.