As anticipated for a few months, with the pandemic the use of digital and alternative payment methods to bank cards or cash would become the trend and now Soriana is the brand that has decided to take a big step in this regard.
Through a press release, it was announced that from now on, the 760 self-service stores in Soriana will accept payment with CoDi, thanks to a strategy implemented by HSBC Mexico.
This achievement is the result of a program in which the National Association of Self-service and Department Stores (ANTAD) and HSBC México have been working for months to improve the shopping experience for consumers in stores and unionized points of sale.
“At HSBC Mexico we are very pleased to continue promoting the use of CoDi® in different companies that receive payments in different parts of the country. The adoption of new digital payment mechanisms complements the options without physical contact, which provides greater security and availability to users, ”said Carlos González Fillad, executive director of transactional banking at HSBC Mexico and Latin America.
The new form of payment would be available to Soriana customers as of this month. The pilot program of this program was carried out in the Organización Soriana self-service stores in the city of Monterrey, Nuevo León during the past month, and now it is a payment option already available in any store throughout the city. Mexican republic.
“For Soriana, offering avant-garde alternatives that allow streamlining processes and reducing the use of cash in our customers’ purchases is a priority, and an option such as CoDi® allows payment of the supermarket without the need for physical contact, only through reading of a code in the checkout line, which is even more convenient ”, commented Mauricio Hinojosa, regional manager of financial services development at Organización Soriana.
For a couple of years, the government promoted the CoDi instant payments infrastructure, with the aim of fostering financial inclusion and bringing more people into the formal economy.
This system has attracted the attention of large firms such as Mercado Libre and Amazon who have winked at this payment method that Corina has now integrated into their ranks.
The operation is simple. Through QR codes the consumer can make payments from their mobile device as well as make electronic transfers all in real time.
The proposal has many opportunities if we consider that it involves and considers all the players in the value generation chain: banks, retailers, fintech and other large and small companies can participate jointly.
Although the advances in the matter are interesting, the truth is that the CoDi has become an unfulfilled promise.
In mid-August of last year, official figures indicated that about 4 million Mexicans They were already registered on this platform, of which only 220 thousand would have carried out a transaction through this system.
The lag in projections is even greater. At one point, the Mexican Bank Association (ABM) projected that 37 million Mexicans would use CoDi by 2022; However, as of May 2020, the figures reveal only 8 percent adoption.
Although the system came with a strong promotional campaign, the truth is that a lack of awareness of this payment system is evident among consumers.
It is necessary to generate greater synergies between all those involved to achieve higher levels of adoption, where without a doubt the greatest beneficiary could be the final consumer.
In this sense, what has been done by ANTAD, HSBC México and Soriana could be an important and large advance, especially at a time when consumption has been digitized in a special way.