Getting the payment gateway becomes more difficult and depends on the symbol

According to the online economy quoted by the world of economics; This has posed a serious challenge to many online businesses, especially start-ups, small and home-based businesses, as most of these businesses do not fit into the e-commerce development format designated for the award, thus allowing formal payment gateways. They are taken away.

Creating this new license and barrier, instead of “organizing”, prevents the formation of new businesses in this field, and on the other hand, leads transactions to older methods such as traditional “card”, opening the way for fraud and damage to companies operating in the field.

Difficulty obtaining a symbol

Field surveys of a number of small businesses and some start-ups in the early stages of their work show that many of these businesses face a number of difficulties in registering for the “e-symbol” due to the rules and structures in place. Eligibility fails to obtain the verifications defined in the system.

Meanwhile, the Center for E-Commerce Development believes that with the systematization of the symbol award process from the last two years and the elimination of expert reviews, the average symbol award time has been reduced to less than one day. While Iran’s position in the global index of ease of starting a business is very miserable, instead of removing the previous obstacles, a new license and obstacle is to be placed in the way of businesses. This is despite the fact that the Deregulation Board has repeatedly emphasized the use of retrospective monitoring mechanisms instead of requiring licensing.

Mustafa Naghipour, secretary of the Fintech Association of the country, says: “During the years we have been interacting with startups and start-up businesses, the requirement to obtain various licenses at the beginning of work has been their most significant problem when starting a business.”

He adds: “O symbol (symbol of electronic trust) was supposed to be a symbol of trust; “Now, instead of proper supervision and building trust, loved ones are looking for licenses, which is the main obstacle to starting a business!”

Emphasis on licensing

Following the widespread negative reactions of FinTech activists to the new requirement, the E-Commerce Development Center issued a statement clarifying various aspects of the issue. In part, the statement said, “The requirement to provide online payment gateways (including PSP and paid companies) to have a symbol as an Internet business license, first in the Security Council, then in anti-money laundering regulations and finally in the law of store terminals to Explicitly stated.

This legal obligation has been implemented for PSP companies since the end of 2009, but in the case of payments, due to special conditions and the need to create some infrastructure, it has been on the agenda of the Central Bank since late last year, and after holding briefings and providing sufficient opportunities, finally It has been notified to paying companies by Shaparak Company.

This legal task has been repeatedly pursued by regulatory authorities, including the Deputy for Crime Prevention of the Judiciary, the Inspectorate General, the Central Headquarters for Combating Commodity and Currency Smuggling, and the e-Commerce Development Center as the custodian of Internet businesses and the Central Bank as the custodian of network organization. “The payment of the country has been questioned, but in order to comply with the principle of gradualness, first PSP companies and then payers, and now only new payment gateways are on the agenda and currently do not even include the previous payment gateways of paying companies.”

However, members of the FinTech Association believe that this interpretation is wrong and that there is no requirement in the law at all for PSPs to pay contributors. The statement went on to emphasize the unequal competitive environment between PSPs and payers: “Obviously, the implementation of a legal obligation for one part of the payment network (PSP companies) and its non-implementation for another part (payment companies), given the very similar function of the portal Internet payment received from any of these two ways for an Internet business, firstly, has disrupted the competition between the two parts of the payment network and will cause the migration of applicants from one part to another, and secondly, the possibility of efficient organization and monitoring of the country’s e-commerce space. “It will be gone.”

“By law, only PSPs are required to provide services to symbolic businesses, and paid businesses are exempt from this,” said Naghipour, acknowledging that trustees are informing the public about this issue and creating such an obligation for payers. Giving this exception to paid companies would make it possible for start-up businesses in the early stages to get a payment gateway and provide services without having multiple licenses and company registrations. But now, with the imposition of these barriers, this sector is practically short of receiving payment services.

Naghipour adds: “Earlier in the meetings we had with the managers of Shaparak and the Central Bank, we emphasized their misinterpretation of this law, but suddenly it is seen that they have issued a circular and forced the payers to follow this plan.” “Small, start-ups and start-ups have suffered enough in recent times, and this new move could put them at risk of extinction,” said the secretary of the FinTech Association, acknowledging that this was Shapark’s most misguided decision this year. With countries such as Canada and the UAE issuing startup visas or recruiting hundreds of thousands of programmers in recent days, policymakers seem to be creating new barriers to doing business every day.

Naghipour adds: “In recent years, we have witnessed an unprecedented increase in the migration of skilled workers, and the continuation of these measures for the few remaining skilled workers leaves no choice but to emigrate, because in similar situations in those countries, the possibility of earning dollars and suffering less.” They are available and prefer to use their energy and expertise in a healthier and more principled environment.

Backward payment network

In recent years, card-to-card transactions have been one of the main payment methods in the country. However, due to its nature, this method opens the way for some abuses and scams. During this period, various startups in the field of Finatech have tried to systematize the payment network of the country, facilitate payment processes for users and business owners, as well as increase the security of transactions made on the basis of various online platforms by designing and developing different payment methods.

Milad Jahandar, another activist in the field of electronic payment industry, says: For some time now, major companies providing online payment services have been designing new payment methods to provide payment gateways to businesses active in social networks (including Instagram, Telegram, etc.). He adds: “All this time we have been trying to create incentives for business owners to encourage them to use these systematic and secure methods.” The migration of transactions on these platforms from card-to-card mode to specific portals both reduces the risk of fraud and helps to develop the country’s payment network.

However, applying such requirements all at once will waste all our efforts and steer transactions to the previous path (ie card to card) which is much less likely to be monitored. Although there are no exact statistics on the number of active businesses on Instagram and other social networks, it is said that the number of jobs created in these platforms is between one and 3 million jobs.

Jahandar adds: Instagram businesses are practically small, start-up and even home-based businesses for which it is not possible to receive tokens. It used to be difficult enough to systematize this space and change the old habits of users and business owners, and now with such a move, the same bit of hope that existed for the improvement of the payment network is lost.

Delegation Board Response

In a part of the statement issued by the Center for E-Commerce Development, it is stated that businesses are required to receive a symbol, to prevent violations and unrest in these different areas of business, and finally to protect the rights of consumers. While experience shows that issuing a symbol has not been a very effective method in controlling violations in this area. “The way to protect the rights of consumers is to monitor, not to create new licenses,” said Mostafa Naghipour. He adds: “Recently, we have seen that e-symbol could not help protect consumer rights, and last year it was observed that even some gambling sites even had e-symbol and official payment gateway.”

On the other hand, Ali Firoozi, director of the National Center for Business Environment Monitoring and Improvement Studies, says that if the purpose of those in charge of this in the banking system and payment network is to fight money laundering, better ways can be chosen instead of requiring businesses to obtain a new license. And had better oversight of payments. He added: “Furthermore, the implementation of such plans requires interaction with existing stakeholders, and history has shown that merely writing the rules of the game unilaterally and unilaterally announced will not produce very good results and the desired result of the government will not be met.”

This member of the Deregulation Board emphasizes that such instructions, rather than being unilateral and top-down, need to be accepted by the stakeholder community in order to have the potential to be implemented. Expressing hope that this issue will be resolved, he said: “We are negotiating with the parties to the issue so that, God willing, this problem will be resolved as soon as possible.”

The Corona outbreak over the past year or two has taken the breath away of many businesses; But the existence of online platforms and social networks such as Instagram was a point of hope that revived hope in the hearts of many businesses and restored a lost market share by allowing them to sell products and services online.

But while this year’s motto is “production, support, and disincentives,” these small, weak businesses are constantly under threat from various quarters. Just a few weeks ago, the activities of many businesses on social networks (especially Instagram) were threatened with a plan to organize the parliament to organize cyberspace. Although the bill has been temporarily removed from the parliament’s agenda, it is said that lawmakers are set to begin reconsidering it soon.

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