HCMCity (VNA) - HCM City’s education sector has set a target nextyear to collect school tuition via bank transfers instead of cash after twoyears of piloting the project at 40 schools. 

Underthe pilot project, students from 40 secondary schools and high schools beganpaying tuition via a school smart card (SSC) in the academic year 2014-15.

Theproject has been carried out by the city’s Department of Education and Trainingin co-operation with the State Bank of Vietnam’s HCM City branch, Vietcombank,BIDV, and Ngoi Nha Xanh Cultural Joint-Stock Company.

Speakingat a meeting on financial solutions in the education sector last week, Le Hoai Nam,deputy director of the education department, said the pilot project hadachieved positive results after two years of implementation.

Thecity now wants to expand the model to all schools citywide.

Underthe project, more than 47,000 SSCs have been issued with total tuitiontransactions via SSC reaching 132 billion VND (5.8 million USD), he said.

Paymentsthrough SSCs help parents pay tuition on time, reduce the risk of studentsholding a large amount of cash, and ease the burden on schools’ human resourcesand time in collecting tuition, he added.

TheEducation Department plans to improve dissemination of information about theproject to teachers, students and parents.

Morefinancial solutions for teachers and education staff will also be offered.

Forexample, the education sector will work with commercial banks to issue creditcards with favourable conditions for teachers, with a balance of 200-300million VND (8,789-13,184 USD).

Speakingat the meeting, Bui Quang Tien, head of the Transaction Department under theState Bank, spoke highly of financial solutions carried out by the city’seducation sector, especially the application of SSC.

Heurged the sector to work closely with agencies to ensure security and safetyfor cardholders.

Studentsas cardholders will have their names and identification numbers on the card.

Parentswill be account holders and will open cards for their children by filling in aform from the SSC project.

SSC’sinformation centre will announce the payable amount to parents, and they caneither pay via e-banking services or make payments at home, banks or schools.

Theamount will be transferred to school accounts, and information will be sent tothe SSC data center to be processed and confirmed.

Parentscan also give pocket money to their children via SSC. The card is exclusivelyused to pay at POS terminals at specified locations at schools only, and is notused to withdraw cash.

Detailsabout payments listed in an SSC account will help parents manage theirchildren’s spending.

Inthe near future, the SSC project will develop new features supporting learning,such as e-textbooks, studying languages online, and daily services such as buscards and library cards, according to Nam.-VNA