2023-08-02 19:52:00
The authorities of the state Central Bank of Cuba (BCC) announced that as of Thursday, August 3 salary payments and financial exchanges in the island’s economy will be through electronic transactions and not in cash when the amounts exceed 5,000 Cuban pesos (CUP).
According to the bank, This measure seeks the “banking of collection and payment transactions between all actors in the economy and with the population”as well as reducing the use of cashwhose scarcity is the reason for frequent complaints from Cubans.
In Press conferenceAlberto Quiñones Betancourt, vice president of the BCC, said that “5,000CUP is established as a maximum limit for cash operations for economic actors that require minor payment operations (…), but All payments that exceed 5,000 pesos must be made by electronic transactions.
This, he emphasized, will be effective “to make payments to workers for salary, bonuses, gratuities and other remuneration for work.”
For his part, Julio A. Pérez Álvarez, general director of the BCC’s Directorate of Operations and Payment System, announced that although the measure enters into force this week, the territories that do not have the conditions created for it will have a period of six monthsand during that time the operations will continue to be in cash even if they exceed 5,000 pesos.
The officials explained that From now on, all businesses that provide goods and services, whether state-owned or not, must have electronic means of payment. such as those questioned EnZona and Transfermóvil, as well as contracted the services of payment gateways or POS. This does not mean that cash cannot be used to make smaller payments, they clarified.
Quiñones Betancourt, in reference to the connection problems that Cuban bank branches often present, stressed that “the conditions must exist in each of our bank offices to respond to the service that will be demanded.”
He also assured that the measure now announced “is nothing new, but it does place us before a new scenario.” He implicitly recognized that Cubans do not trust banks, when he emphasized that “we must give businessmen confidence so that every day they see the banking system as their main ally”.
The officials recognized the deterioration of ATMs in Cuba, which according to the BCC, are affected “due to the lack of parts and spare parts, another sign of the effects of the blockade,” although the real problem is the shortage of cash.
the BCC he pointed in a note that the “operations with cash have grown in greater proportion as a consequence of inflationary factors and others”.
For this reason, they indicated, from now on the ATMs will only be available for operations with cards of people who collect their pensions, salaries and other personal assets through them, as well as to operate deposits in savings accounts.
The officials made no reference to already existing restrictions on the use of transfermóvilwidely denounced by Cubans, who It only allows you to carry out five daily operations, as well as a maximum of 120,000 pesos per month for a bank transfer or withdrawal.
Although during the Covid-19 pandemic the use of electronic payment gateways spread in Cuba and the Government created MLC cards as the only means of payment in the dollar stores of the GAESA military consortium, most of the operations in the country continue to be produced in the informal economy; that is, “by the left”.
As various experts have anticipated, the current measure would seek to take control over the monetary exchanges of Cubans, forcing them to deposit their money in state financial institutions in which it has been seen that they do not trust.
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