Gov’t Targets Digital Payments for Christmas Workers

The Government is targetting payments to some workers engaged under the annual Christmas work programme through the LYNK® digital wallet.

Minister of Finance and the Public Service, Dr. Hon. Nigel Clarke, said the intention is to undertake the digital payments as a pilot this year to encourage greater take-up of JAM-DEX, which is the Central Bank Digital Currency (CBDC).

National Commercial Bank (NCB) offers JAM-DEX through LYNK.

Using the digital wallet will increase efficiency in disbursing funds for Christmas work and reduce the cost to Government.

Through the LYNK app, persons will be able to receive payments using a smartphone, rather than having to go to a bank to cash a cheque.

The Minister said he intends to offer his constituency, St. Andrew North Western, as part of the pilot for the digital payments and encouraged other Members of Parliament to do likewise.

He noted that the pilot will enable the Government to “assess the things we need to work on”.

“The Government wants to see the digital economy and society take hold, because that is the future. There are a lot of transactions that take place today; payments that are cash-based, which is suboptimal. I think of things like some of the work programmes, where people work at Christmas time and they make the place look good… all of those thousands and thousands of persons are paid cash.

“The Prime Minister has stated, as a goal, that eventually, we want that to be paid through the CBDC, which has a number of advantages,” Dr. Clarke pointed out.

He was speaking at the media launch of the LYNK Automated Banking Machine (ABM) Cash in and Cash out feature at the NCB Atrium in New Kingston, on September 20.

JAM-DEX provides a safe, efficient, and convenient way to pay for goods and services.

Dr. Clarke said the necessary work will be done to ensure that consumers and merchants are signed up to utilise the facility.

“We have to do the work up front to make sure that people are signed up and, importantly, merchants within the space are signed up, because it doesn’t make sense to get your CBDC and you can’t use it,” he noted.

Dr. Clarke added that “the Government of Jamaica is intent… to ensure that financial services are available below Half-Way-Tree.”

The Christmas Work Programme is an employment generation initiative that focuses on the beautification, bushing and maintenance of critical roadways, patching of roads, and drain cleaning. It provides short-term employment to many Jamaicans.

Full CBDC implementation is expected to significantly reduce traditional challenges associated with many Jamaicans not having a bank account.

The new LYNK ABM Cash in and Cash out feature allows persons to add or withdraw funds from the LYNK wallet – whether or not they have a bank account – from approximately 300 NCB automated banking machines islandwide.

LYNK, which was launched in December 2021, has approximately 145,000 individual customers and almost 3,000 merchants.

More than $5 million worth of transactions have been conducted through the platform.