Central bank reports simple transfer boom

Simplified money transfers are surging, including mobile payments initiated with smartphone applications.

In 2018, the volume of these transactions almost tripled, according to a report from the Bank of Korea.

The central bank said Wednesday in a report covering electronic payments in 2018 that the average daily volume of simple money transfers increased 194.1 percent last year to 104.5 billion won ($92.13 million), along with a 102.5 percent rise in the number of daily transfers to 1.41 million.

Simple transfer and payment services refer to those that use password authentication instead of digital certificates. As the certificate requirement was eased in 2015, users have flocked to easy transfer services, such a KakaoPay and Naver Pay.

Toss, one of the most popular transfer apps, has attracted over 10 million users since its introduction in 2015.

Simple payment services, as opposed to transfer services, were used an average of 3.92 million times per day last year, up 87.5 percent from the previous year. The average daily volume totaled 126 billion won, up 86.2 percent.

In 2016, the average daily number of simple payments amounted to just 859,000, and the total volume was 26 billion won.

Payments usage has surged, especially in retail and manufacturing. Simplified payments in these categories accounted for 82 percent all simplified payments.

The utilization of payment gateways increased as well, with the services used on average 8.26 million times a day last year, up 29.8 percent.

The central bank also said that more Koreans are using electronic methods to pay for bills, such as housing maintenance fees. The average daily usage of electronic bill services last year was about 160,000 transactions, up 26.6 percent.

BY CHAE YUN-HWAN [chae.yunhwan@joongang.co.kr]