E-payment transactions worth N500 billion are processed through Remita, a multi channel electronic payment platform, indicating increased adoption of electronic payment in the country. Managing Director/Chief Executive SystemSpecs, the owners of Remita, Mr. John Obaro disclosed this at a press conference in Lagos. He said that with the extension of the cashless policy nationwide, Remita offers the best opportunity for individuals and corporate bodies to enjoy the benefits of electronic payment transactions. Remita, he said is a one-stop shared services platform for processing e- Payments, e-Collections, e-Payroll, and e-Schedule. “The platform was developed by SystemSpecs nine years ago in response to challenges faced by corporates in making payments after salary processing. The focus, he said is full automation of payments from source until the beneficiary end point, adding that Remita can be used by organisations to move money to many banks at the same time. He said the platform also pioneered electronic delivery of schedules with associated funds. He said for example, Remita is integrated with the Federal Government Integrated Financial Management System (GIFMIS) which is deployed at most MDAs for effective financial management, adding that Remita handles the payments of federal government expenditure, and the collection of its Internally Generated Revenues under the Treasury Single Account (TSA) initiative that is led by Office of the Accountant General of the Federation (OAGF). Speaking on the features of Remita, Mr Demola Igbalajobi, General Manager, Remita Services, said that Remita has four main modules namely, e-Payment, e-Collections, e-Payroll, e-Schedule. He explained that with the e-payment modules, individuals and organisations can transfer funds, to and from accounts in Commercial Banks, Microfinance Banks, Primary Mortgage Institutions and Mobile wallets. It can also be used to issue electronic cheques for payments and remittances to suppliers, vendors, employees, statutory organisations, government agencies and other third parties, as well as process Standing Orders and Direct Debit across banks, seamlessly. “With the e-payment module you can: view balances on accounts across all banks on one screen; Pay from any of your bank accounts simultaneously; Initiate and approve payments from anywhere, any time; Replicate organisation’s payment authorization workflow; Monitor the status of each transaction from start to end.” Igbalajobi added that the security framework includes Options of secure login, role-based access, amount-based security, soft tokens, hard tokens, biometrics, etc. The e-payment module can be used to access comprehensive, detailed, online reports; generate evidence of payment following payment as well as send payment notification via SMS and email. He said that the e-collection module of Remita is a multi-channel funds collection platform. “With Remita e-collections platform, billers can to: Define online Pay-In forms to capture information that is required from the payer at time of payment; Set up as many different collection items (Service Types) as necessary e.g. School fees, Uniforms; PTA Levy etc; Specify different bank accounts for each service type, if desired. No need to issue bank account details to customers; generate invoices and send to customers electronically. In addition to these, the e-collections module, he added offers payers and billers seven collection channels”