source: Berita Harian Online

The service will be available nationwide at all BHP, Caltex and three Shell-branded stations owned by Dialog Group Bhd.

Consumers will have to open either a savings or a current account with EON Bank, which is the only bank providing payment transactions through the MyKad at the moment.

This facility is similar to the debit card service, where consumers deposit an amount in their debit card account before using it.

EON Bank head of consumer banking Michael Lor said those who wanted to use the service needed to open an account with the bank while existing account holders needed to register at ePetrol kiosks.

Currently, there are 250 bank customers using the service at 11 petrol stations in Petaling Jaya and Kuala Lumpur under a two-month pilot project.

Local payments solution provider ePetrol Holding Sdn Bhd teamed up with EON Bank for the system.

“We are looking at attracting 30,000 users and there will be no extra charges, except for a simple RM6 registration fee,” said Lor after the launch of the cashless payment service by Bank Negara assistant governor Nor Shamsiah Yunus yesterday.

ePetrol president Ngau Boon Keat said they also used the pilot project to test the rebate system to prepare for the petrol subsidy programme using MyKad when the Government was ready.

“We give a 15-sen rebate per litre up to 150 litres a month as a test,” he said.

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Group consumer banking head Michael Lor Chee Leng said the targeted customers would be their existing 1.4 million customers and new customers.

“The new service will be available for customers nationwide after a two-month pilot programme involving 250 EON Bank customers,” he told reporters after the launch of the cashless payment service yesterday.

The bank and ePetrol Holdings Sdn Bhd jointly launched the cashless payment service at BHPetrol, Caltex and Dialog-owned petrol stations.

Lor said users have to open an account with EON Bank and link it to their MyKad as the way to debit payments for the fuel purchases from the account.

Chairman of ePetrol Holdings Tan Sri Abdul Rashid Hussain said a discount of 15 sen per litre for the first 150 litres would be offered in the pilot programme.

He said the company was also in talks with three local banks to launch its cashless payment service.

“We plan to launch this service abroad and negotiations with two governments (from Middle East and Southeast Asia) are ongoing,” he added.

On its proposal to the Government on the fuel subsidy management solution, he said the company was still waiting for them to respond and that there was no time line set.

Besides, he said the bank had allocated RM30mil this year to refurbish 30 banks and open five new branches.

He added that the bank had refurbished five branches so far.

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source: Biz Edge

source: Harian Metro, Bisnes

source: Utusan Malaysia

ePetrol Holdings, established in 2003, is led by a team of industry experts and leaders from the oil and gas, payment, banking and smart-card industries.

Executive vice-president Jeff Perera said the ePetrol system – with debit, credit or prepaid payment services – would enable the MyKad to be used to pay for fuel purchases at petrol stations nationwide.

“There is no necessity to carry another card to enjoy any fuel subsidy as all Malaysians carry a MyKad with identification and payment capabilities,” he told StarBiz at the World Congress on Information Technology 2008 (WCIT) in Kuala Lumpur recently.

Perera said the ePetrol fuel subsidy management module was an integrated and centralised purchasing and payment system between consumers, oil companies, banks and the Government.

“The platform has the capability and flexibility to accept any set of rules to effectively monitor, manage and control fuel subsidies down to the individual consumer level,” he said.

The benefits of the system include:

• Automatically identifying consumers entitled to fuel subsidies;
• Managing the amount of subsidies to be allocated to each consumer;
• Controlling the frequency of the subsidy to be provided – weekly, monthly and so forth; and
• Managing how the subsidy is provided (in a lump sum or as a percentage of the purchase).

The ePetrol system, which was showcased by the Multimedia Development Corp and National Registration Department at the WCIT, garnered much attention from the public.

Even Prime Minister Datuk Seri Abdullah Ahmad Badawi was said to be suitably impressed when shown a short demonstration of the system by ePetrol Holdings’ owners, RHB Group founder Tan Sri Rashid Hussain and Dialog Group Bhd chairman and group managing director Ngau Boon Keat, when he visited the booth.

Perera said the system would enable the Government to lift price controls and let market forces determine the pump price of fuel and still be able to selectively provide fuel subsidy benefits only to deserving consumers.

As the scheme benefited only MyKad-holders, subsidies for non-Malaysians and cross-border fuel smuggling would also be reduced, he added.

“This can result in potential savings of billions of ringgit per annum, which can be channelled toward generating greater economic growth and development,” he said.

In fact, Domestic Trade and Consumer Affairs Minister Shahrir Samad was quoted in a recent report that subsidised fuel in the future could be available only to Malaysians carrying their microchip-based national identity cards.

Moreover, Perera said, multinational oil companies had endorsed the system as technologically compatible with their retail station information technology systems; thus no additional substantial capital investment would be necessary.

“The ePetrol system is now available and ready to go. It can be deployed countrywide to consumers as they already carry a MyKad.

“We will undertake all technology, infrastructure and development investments. Therefore, no Government funding is needed,” he said.

The subsidy management scheme could also be extended to other controlled items such as natural gas, liquefied petroleum gas, cooking oil, rice, flour and sugar.

An industry expert pointed out that the restructuring of the fuel subsidy system must be done to improve the social economic welfare of the rakyat.

“That should be its main aim; otherwise it defeats the purpose. The ePetrol system looks like a practical and efficient system, but whether it will work to expectations is left to be seen.

“If the ePetrol system is chosen, the onus is on the Government to come up with a great set of criteria that ensures the right group of people get the right amount of subsidies as well as plug leakages and wastage,” he said.

He added that the ePetrol system would also help boost the usage of the MyKad, deemed a half-a-billion ringgit white elephant as it has not lived up to its potential in terms of multi-purpose usage.

Besides the MyKad solution, the Government is said to be considering a proposal to replace the existing octane ratings of petrol – research octane number (RON) 92 and 97 – with RON 95 and 99.

The Government would then allocate most of the subsidy into the RON 95 used by the lower to medium-income groups while those with high-performance and luxury cars can opt for the more expensive and less-subsidised RON99 fuel.

Another proposal is the fleet card approach which involves issuing authorised cards for vehicle owners from lower income groups.

Eligible citizens who hold the fleet card can fill their vehicles with subsidised fuel. Higher-income citizens would pay rates that more closely reflect market prices.

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