Faiza Tehseen

The State Bank of Pakistan needs to formulate a policy to provide ease of currency exchange to freelancers. “A national money exchange hub is necessary to provide freelancers with ease of converting their foreign currency into the Pakistani rupee,” stresses Zohaib Lashari, a freelancer and coordinator of student support mentor in Enablers, a reputed Amazon FBA company,  and Pakistan’s largest e-commerce trading and training platform.

He said the establishment of local market hubs for dollar exchange was the need of the hour. “Enablers helps freelancers provide their services to foreign companies or individuals. These freelancers remit their earnings using different channels. These channels are used as exchangers to convert foreign payments, mostly in dollars, into Pakistani currency. These channels are used as per the preference of the client. We can not bind them to use any specific payment channel.

However, the foreign exchange channels, also called merchants, usually deduct large amounts as fees or taxes. And when we further exchange the dollars, we are charged according to the open market rates. This is because we do not have any proper platform to get our own dollars directly,” explained Zohaib Lashari.

He went on to say that they had to hire a third party to purchase dollars. “Our main issue is purchasing dollars and converting our own currency into dollars. Sometimes we get it done through the money changers, but it is too costly as we have to pay Rs25 to Rs30 above and over the existing dollar rate. Furthermore, a money exchanger doesn’t transfer dollars in your account if he is paid in rupees. Such issues are forcing a great number of Pakistani freelancers to move to other countries,” he further explained.

Lashari noted that official exchange channels operated under the policy of the State Bank would help them get our hard-earned money with ease. “If the government offers such favourable packages, people will be encouraged to invest in the IT industry.” He said a proper government policy could attract a lot of foreign direct investment to the country in the IT/freelancing sectors.

Speaking about the policymaking for opening new payment gateways in the country, Sajid Hussain, a software engineer and Chief Executive Officer of em@ila Private Limited, told WealthPK that Pakistan had a great number of software engineers and freelancers serving different national and international channels. “However, transferring money they earn from their clients with ease is the biggest problem for them. So, a proper national gateway is badly needed to facilitate them.”

He said though Bank Alfalah had set up a payment gateway, it was still at the initial level. However, he said the merchant service of Bank Alfalah was beneficial for people related to the software industry. “I use it myself and even recommend my customers and people related to the IT sector to use it. Even our regular European customers can now pay us in Pakistani rupee through this channel.”

He said international merchants usually took a minimum of 25 days to release payments, but Bank Alfalah’s merchant service transferred the amount within three days without any extra deduction. “They just charge a minimum fee of 2.5% to 3.5%. Pakistan needs to develop and improve services of this type,” stressed Sajid Hussain.

Credit: Independent News Pakistan-WealthPk