By Ali Imran
ISLAMABAD: Special Assistant to the Prime Minister on Poverty Alleviation and Social Protection, Senator Dr. Sania Nishtar together with MD Utility Stores Corporation (USC), Taha Aziz Magrabi visited a Utility Store in G-6 Islamabad on Wednesday to field test the integration of data and Point of Sales (PoS) systems between Ehsaas, National Bank of Pakistan (NBP) and USC under the Ehsaas Rashan Riayat programme.
At the Utility Store, Dr. Sania witnessed the first transaction and met with the first cohort of beneficiaries who were declared eligible under the testing phase, after they enrolled for Ehsaas Rashan through 8171.
Through the newly integrated system, the eligibility of the buyers was verified, and they were able to avail subsidy on the purchase of flour, cooking oil, ghee and pulses.
“It is very encouraging to see the successful system and data integration which is a result of the hard work of USC, NBP and Ehsaas teams. This is, in fact, a great milestone. The integrated Point of Sale system will enable the USC to pass on the Ehsaas Rashan subsidies to eligible families”, said Dr. Sania.
Adding further, she said, “Work under the Ehsaas Rashan programme is underway, registration and scrutiny of applicants is ongoing and very soon the Ehsaas Rashan subsidies will be available through a network of Utility Stores of Corporation and NBP authorized Kiryana stores all over the country.”
With the launch of Rashan Riayat, close to 4000 locations of Utility Stores will go live on the same day. The beneficiaries will follow the same check out experience as they do at any other NBP enabled Kiryana store i.e. CNIC and cell phone. To make it easy for the customers Utility Stores will also have the signboard “Ehsaas Rashan Riayat” displayed.
MD Utility Stores said that the Ehsaas Rashan subsidies will also be operationalized shortly through a network of Utility Stores all over the country. Under the Rs. 120 billion programme, a subsidy of Rs. 1,000 a month will be granted to each of 20 million eligible families on the purchase of flour, pulses, cooking oil and ghee.
Captain (R) Saeed Ahmed Nawaz, Additional Secretary Poverty Alleviation and Social Safety Division; Gul Bahar Khan, General Manager NBP; Hisham Jan Kiani, Regional Head North NBP; and senior officials of Utility stores including GM Store Operations, GM IT, Zonal Manager, Regional Manager Islamabad and Manager Coordination were also present.
