Bank of Abyssinia has begun issuing e-commerce enabled domestic and international cards that customers can use to make online payments. The Bank has availed six types of Visa brand interest-free international and domestic debit cards. A directive issued by the National Bank of Ethiopia in November 2020, states that an Ethiopian resident is allowed to open a foreign currency saving account with a minimum of 50 dollars. However, usage of this account is limited to education, medical purposes, and travel expenses abroad to be approved upon presentation of valid documents. The directive goes on to limit usage stating "the account holder shall have the right to withdraw 10pc of the foreign currency balance with a debit card" Pre-paid cards that will be topped up with foreign currency based on an approved amount can be used to make payments for approved purposes as directed by the central bank. E-commerce enabled cards will allow customers to make domestic online payments once services providers integrate their systems. Bank of Abyssinia has so far issued more than 800,000 cards to its customers. The Bank currently has 700,000 active users on its mobile banking solutions who transact 1.2 billion Br a week.
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