Statistics suggest that hand-to-hand payments have declined significantly these days as one of the means in taking caution against coronavirus transmission.

In March, the National Bank of Rwanda, (BNR), confirmed that within three months from March 19, 2020, no fee will be deducted from a person who withdraws money from a bank account to a Mobile Money account or from a Mobile Money bank account to reduce the risk of coronavirus infection.

According to a report by Insight2impact in collaboration with RURA, in the first week of the Stay Home program the number of transactions via mobile telephones reached 1.2 million, up from 600,000 in the previous week of Stay Home.

In the last week of April 2020, 1.8 million people transferred money through mobile telephone technologies in Rwanda.

From March 9 to March 15, a total of Rwf10.7 billion was transferred, and in the week ending March 22, the amount hit Rwf 24 billion.

The report shows that although the vast majority of people who transfer money through mobile phone technologies are men, women have also increasingly using the platform, registering 31% but in the fifth week of Stay home it was 36%.