Monday, February 27, 2023, 00:20
A large part of the Spanish population has a bank account with its corresponding debit or credit card. But there are thousands of people in a situation of economic vulnerability who have neither one nor the other. Even so, they have the possibility of withdrawing money that another person has previously sent them from an ATM: it is enough to have an ordinary mobile phone. It doesn’t even have to be a ‘smartphone’.
The system is called Hal Cash, an electronic platform to which a number of financial entities are affiliated and which allows users, whether they are ‘banked’ or not, to send and receive money instantly through a telephone notification.
The sender only needs to know the telephone number of the beneficiary. Not even, although it is not normal, does it have to have an account in the banks integrated into the platform. There are pages and applications that offer their users the option of sending Hal Cash orders.
The process is as follows: the issuer registers the order, and agrees with the recipient a four-digit secret code. Once the shipment has been made, the system sends an SMS to the beneficiary’s mobile phone with the amount of the operation and the numerical reference. In addition, the message notifies the term you have to withdraw money from Hal Cash ATMs.
Once in front of the cashier, the recipient enters the details of the order: their phone number, the amount, the SMS reference and the secret code. Finally, he collects the money.
Instant and free transfer
It is an instant transfer, which takes the same time to execute as an SMS, and it is free. As indicated on the platform’s website, the minimum amount of an order is 10 euros, and the maximum is 600. But it is recommended not to use amounts that require the use of ten-euro bills, because not all ATMs have them.
In addition, the same beneficiary cannot receive more than 3,000 euros a day or more than 6,000 in a period of 30 days.
The main drawback of this platform is that it still includes few banking entities: Bankinter, Abanca, Laboral Kutxa, Evo, Grupo Cooperativo Cajamar, Euro Automatic Cash, Pecunpay, Pin4 Cardless Cash and Payment Alliance International.