SBP Digitize Federal Government Payments through RAAST
State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) and the Controller General of Accounts Pakistan (CGAP) signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) for digitizing federal government payments through RAAST- Pakistan’s First Instant Payment System, launched in January 2021 by SBP.
The details released from the SBP said that in the pilot phase, the salaries, and pensions of a group of federal government employees will be transferred via RAAST.
It further said the RAAST will verify beneficiaries’ details with their banks on a real time basis to ensure that the payments are credited to the right person.
Raast is a flagship initiative of SBP, which provides a simple, fast, low-cost, interoperable, and secure electronic payment platform for instant processing of high-volume retail payments.
This digitized system can make payments to multiple beneficiaries at a time to cater high volume government payments like salaries, pension, and social security payments.