September 22: Nepali migrant workers can send home money from foreign countries through digital medium from now onwards.

Nepal Rastra Bank has made arrangement for the migrant workers to send remittance through mobile and internet banking as well as electronic cards, digital wallets and other electronic means.

The Foreign Exchange Management Department of the Nepal Rastra Bank issued a notice on Monday (September 21) informing about the new arrangement which has effectively ended the compulsion for people to rely upon remittance agents or visit banks to receive remittance.

In order to benefit from this service, the migrant workers need to activate digital service like mobile and internet banking from their respective banks in Nepal as well as Nepali payment gateways that provide digital wallet service.

With this new system, money transferred from abroad will be available in Nepal instantly and the details of the transaction will also be available, says NRB.

Executive Director of the central bank’s Foreign Exchange Management Department Bam Bahadur Mishra claimed that this new system will address the problem of entering wrong account number and also get rid of the hassles of showing one’s citizenship certificate to receive the amount.

He further said that the central bank introduced this system ahead of Dashain considering the fact that the remittance inflow to Nepal increases significantly during the festive season.

“This arrangement will allow migrant workers to send money using their smart phones and other digital technology. But the users must activate digital service first,” says Mishra.

The mobile and internet banking services provided by banks can be used to avail this facility. The migrant workers can also use eSewa, IME Pay, Fone Pay, Khalti among 14 payment gateways to send money from abroad, according to NRB.

However, for the service to work seamlessly, the banks and remittance service providers have to collaborate with the electronic payment gateways of the respective countries.