BUTTERWORTH: The government is prepared to review the disbursement of e-Tunai Rakyat to bank accounts of living aid recipients who do not own smartphones.
Finance Minister Lim Guan Eng said there have yet to be complaints stemming from the matter since the launch of the e-Tunai initiative, which saw qualified e-wallet users of various applications each claiming RM30 as an incentive from the government.
The Cost of Living Aid assistance was introduced by the government to alleviate household expenditure among the B40 group, who mostly may not have access to smartphones.
“Let us move ahead with the programme (e-Tunai Rakyat) and see how it goes.
“If there are many grievances (on disbursement issues), we will consider (reviewing the approach for living aid recipients). We can review it in the future,” he said after the launching of e-Tunai Rakyat initiative at Tesco Bagan Ajam here today.
To date, Lim said that a total of 1.7 million applications had been made to claim the RM30 since the cashless initiative was launched on Tuesday.
About 1.32 million of the applications have been approved involving almost RM40 million.
He reiterated that the initiative was introduced to promote cashless transactions.
“This system is much better and efficient as we can ensure the payment made are transparent without any element of misappropriation, embezzlement and corruption.”