Ghana intensifies moves to get off PayPal’s blacklist

The Ghana Interbank Payment and Settlement Systems (GHIPSS) has told Citi Business News it has intensified moves to integrate online payment company PayPal unto its platform to allow Ghanaians purchase goods and services online.

According to GHIPSS it has a robust system which is able to ward off fraudsters from hacking and fraud incidences. PayPal in 2004 blacklisted Ghana together with Nigeria and other sub-Saharan countries due to high incidence of credit card fraud from these countries mostly on EBay and Amazon online stores.

But even though Nigeria in 2014 was taken off PayPal’s blacklist, Ghana remains on the list denying Ghanaians from being able to purchase and pay for their goods and services online using PayPal.

Speaking to Citi Business News the Chief Executive Officer of GHIPSS Archie Hesse said PayPal has not approached the Ghanaian authorities on wanting to allowing Ghanaians full access to their system.

‘If you want to introduce a third one PayPal as well, nobody is against that. But let me say that PayPal has not approached us yet, but if they do we will together with the Bank of Ghana look at their operations and work the modalities to see how we will integrate them” Archie Hesse stated.

He further stated that ‘for now we are ensuring that we cover all the domestic payments while we use visa and master card for international transaction’.

In 2013 a group of Ghanaians petitioned PayPal to delist Ghana from countries who cannot use their system.

But their request did not sail through.

Archie Hesse believes in the interim Ghanaians must use local online payments systems and promote them so they can become globally accepted ways of payment for goods and services.

“What we are doing is that we want to enable payments and if majority of the payment is made locally that is where we will concentrate on, however we also have the responsibility to ensure that Ghanaians can purchase goods and services abroad. We also have the facility in that regard, so we have the visa and the master card who are still in existence in the country.”