Skopje, 27 February 2022

The digitalization of services in the banking system brings greater availability and lower commissions, and thus greater financial inclusion of the population. The data point to a growing trend of digitalization of banking services, which was particularly pronounced at the beginning of the pandemic, but continued during 2021. This was pointed out by the Governor of the National Bank, Anita Angelovska Bezhoska, in the "Agenda 35" show, in which she spoke, among other things, about how much our banks follow European trends in services to households and corporate sector.

- There is a trend of greater focus of banks on the customer needs, primarily in the field of digitalization. This was especially evident during the pandemic, which by its very nature required the restriction of physical contact. Thus, for the first three quarters of last year, the use of payment cards for transactions in trade increased, in terms of value by about 16%, and by about 15% in the number of transactions, which is 4 times higher than the number of cash withdrawal transactions.  There is a significant shift in the use of cards for online transactions, where a growth of about 40 percent has been registered. - Angelovska Bezhoska said. She noted that the central bank follows these trends and make influence, where possible - that is, the regulatory framework.

- We try to encourage larger competition, larger participation of new players in this market, which will mean better service, greater availability of citizens, lower commissions for the services they can use and ultimately, all this will have a positive impact on  the financial inclusion of the population - the Governor said. In this regard, a new Law on Payment Services has been prepared by the National Bank and the Ministry of Finance, which aims to increase competition in the payment services market.