Halyk Bank of Kazakhstan issued more than 1.3 mn of payment cards, 1mn of which under Visa system

/Kazakhstan today, October 9, 03/ - The Halyk Bank of Kazakhstan issued more 1.3 mn of payment cards, 1mn of which under Visa system. The Vice President of HBK OJSC, Serik Svyatov informed about this fact today, on October 9 in Almaty. According to his information, the bank today has the widest network of card servicing, that accounts for 400 ATMs and 660 branches that cash in the card accounts, what comprises 70% of the given segment of Kazakhstan market. Out of 2.5 th point of sales in the Republic that accept Visa payment cards, 900 cooperate with Halyk Bank. "If earlier only transactions on cashing in was available through ATMs, now a wide range of clearings exist", - S. Svyatov noted. As the bank informs, starting from last year the volume of withdrawing of cash using cards was very high. Almost all cash charged was immediately withdrawn through ATMs or post-terminals of the bank. The volume of sales through servicing points was not high and amounted to KZT200 mn per month. As of today this figure has been increased two times, and in the next year the Halyk bank plans to increase it by the same amount. Beside this, the source says that the Halyk Bank, which launched issuing of cards with Visa microprocessors a year ago, intends to replace all cards issued under this system by chip cards. At the same time, bank will correspondingly be adapting the system of its servicing. In general, S. Svyatov stressed, Halyk Bank will actively develop and expand its activities in the sphere of payment cards in future. . HBK received a status of a principal member of international payment system Visa International in 1996. [2003-10-09]