Bangladesh Bank is going to ask Grameenphone to stop the media advertisement of its mobile financial service, Mobicash, as the contents of the campaign is creating ‘confusion’ in the financial sector, said officials of central bank. Besides, the central bank is now thinking to stop the financial transaction of Mobicash as it (Grameenphone) is not authorised to operate mobile financial service like scheduled banks, they said.
The central bank is likely to make decision today in this regard and it may issue separate letters to Grameenphone along with its mother concern Telenor and Bangladesh Telecommunication Regulatory Commission.
The BB has recently launched an investigation into Mobicash to find out if the service is violating the banking rules.
The central bank earlier asked five banks, including Islami Bank Bangladesh and Dutch-Bangla Bank, which have agreement with GP for Mobicash service, to submit the details of the agreement.
A BB official told New Age on Wednesday that a telecom operator could not appoint agents for any banking service.
Besides, Grameenphone is now advertising on the print and electronic media to popularise its financial services provided by Mobicash, he said.
Against the backdrop, the clients get confused about the services of Mobicash as the banks usually authorise to provide the services, the official said.
‘The agents of Mobicash have recently started to open accounts of mobile financial services on behalf of the banks which have made confusion in the banking sector,’ he said.
The official said for agent banking, the BB had a separate guideline and if any entity wanted to run banking through agents, then it would have to be abided by the agent banking guideline.
According to the central bank approval, Mobicash can operate three types of service — ticket purchasing for cricket match, ticket buying for train and payment of utility bills on behalf of the clients.
Asked about the issue, a senior GP official earlier told New Age that
Mobicash service was being operated completely maintaining the rules and regulations.
‘The Mobicash agents are linked up with the partner banks under the agreement. And the agreement was approved by the BB and the BTRC,’ he said.
-With New Age input
