FILE PHOTO: Bacolod City Mayor Alfredo Abelardo “Albee” Benitez | Photo courtesy of Albee Benitez’s Facebook page
BACOLOD CITY — Deputy Governor Bernadette Romulo Puyat of the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) and Mayor Alfredo Abelardo Benitez launched Bacolod’s Paleng-QR Ph Plus at the Libertad Public Market on Tuesday, March 14.
Bacolod is the first city to adopt the program in Western Visayas.
“We are happy to note that 1,889 or 78 percent of registered market vendors and 1,158 or 59 percent of transport drivers as of end-February 2023 in the city are already onboarded to the Paleng-QR Ph Plus. With this, Bacolod is on track to becoming a digitalized and financially inclusive city,” Puyat said.
The program aims to maximize digital cashless payments through smartphones in markets and tricycle hubs.
Benitez said Bacolod is the seventh city in the country to adopt the Paleng-QR Ph Plus. He said the cashless transactions are part of his push to make Bacolod a more intelligent and digital city.
Councilor Celia Flor, chairperson of the city council’s committee on markets and slaughterhouses and author of City Ordinance 1019 adopting the Paleng-QR Ph Plus program in Bacolod, said it is part of the mayor’s vision to make Bacolod an intelligent city.
“We will encourage not only the use of digital payments but digital technology to ease the lives of our constituents,” she said.
Puyat said Bacolodnons can now enjoy the many benefits of cashless payments.
“The benefits of Paleng-QR Ph Plus create ripples of progress for our communities and the entire economy,” she said.
In the first two years of the COVID-19 pandemic, digital payments enabled the conduct of business and purchases in the safety of homes.
“Now that most of us are able go out, customers can buy what they need from markets or pay for transportation without having to bring cash,” Puyat said.
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