A staggering 69% of the country’s population—or about 53 million Filipinos—have no bank accounts, according to Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas’ Q3 2021 study. One of the main reasons? Access.
Many of those who are unbanked lack the documents required to open bank accounts, which is why they opt to just keep their cash at home for easy access in case of emergency.
To encourage more Filipinos to go into formal banking, GCash recently partnered with the Bank of the Philippine Islands (BPI) to reach unbanked Filipinos, particularly working millennials.
The partnership between GCash and BPI offers BPI MySaveUp, an in-app feature in the GSave marketplace.
“The collaboration with BPI allows GCash users to enjoy the bank’s wide reach and services nationwide. BPI MySaveUp gives the underbanked and unbanked Filipinos access to formal banking through the GCash app,” Winsley Bangit, chief customer officer at GCash said.
With BPI MySaveUp, unbanked Filipinos can easily apply for and own a formal and all-digital account minus the long application process.
This new feature also offers free fund transfer from a user’s BPI MySaveUp account to his GCash wallet and vice versa.
Users also have an option to get a BPI Debit Mastercard in any BPI branch for only P150 so they can access their account and withdraw from thousands of BancNet and Mastercard ATMs worldwide.
How to open a BPI MySaveUp account
Ready to open a BPI MySaveUp account? Here are the simple steps to follow:
- Go to your GCash app and click the GSave icon. Choose BPI MySaveUp.
- Click Open Savings Account.
- Agree to use GCash profile.
- After receiving the email confirmation from BPI, you can start accessing BPI MySaveUp.