MANILA, PHILIPPINES — Maya, the country’s all-in-one digital banking and money app, has made cashless transactions a lot easier in public markets nationwide with the rollout of its Paleng-QR initiative in Central Visayas, starting with Bohol province.
Maya has transformed Bohol’s Tagbilaran City Public Market into a digi-palengke in a ceremony led by Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) Deputy Governor Bernadette Romulo-Puyat and Tagbilaran City Mayor Jane Yap.
The Paleng-QR Ph initiative is spearheaded by the BSP and the Department of Interior and Local Government (DILG), and it aims to empower the City Government of Tagbilaran to help public market vendors and tricycle drivers accept cashless payments from any customer via the QR Ph, the country’s standard for QR payments.
“Small merchants and Filipino consumers are not only enjoying a hassle-free payment experience for their everyday transactions with Maya QR but also creating a financial footprint that allows them to access more advanced banking services offered by Maya,” said Mar Lazaro, Maya’s Head of Enterprise Business.
Since QR Ph’s launch in 2019 for person-to-person (P2P) payments and in 2021 for person-to-merchant (P2M) payments, Maya has led the charge among financial institutions in the rollout of the QR Ph national standard and now counts over 800,000 merchant touchpoints powered by QR Ph-capable Maya QR. “Basta QR Ph, pwede kami,” Mar added.
Building digi-palengkes nationwide is part of Maya’s own LGUs Embracing and Accelerating Digitalization (L.E.A.D). Through this program, LGUs encourage local merchants and constituents to digitalize their transactions with Maya’s business-in-a-box payment solutions and disbursement tools.
On top of digitalizing public markets, Maya has become the growth partner of choice of Philippine businesses. These enterprises include pharmacies, transportation, travel, retail stores, public utilities, food, hospitals, service providers, and schools.
