SINGAPORE / SHOPPING CULTURE / QR AND MOBILE PAYMENT HISTORY
By The Memory desk · Historical reference · Sources checked 7 October 2026
PayNow went live on 10 July 2017. The Association of Banks in Singapore (ABS) built it on FAST, the interbank transfer system, so that customers of seven banks could send money instantly to a mobile number or NRIC/FIN instead of a bank account number. SGQR followed in September 2018. It was a single national QR label, developed under a task force co-led by the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) and the Infocomm Media Development Authority (IMDA), and it put 27 payment schemes on one sticker. Between them, the two made it possible for a hawker stall to take digital payment with little more than a printed label.
The PayNow and SGQR history is short, but it rests on a longer one. FAST arrived in 2014, the same year DBS launched its PayLah! wallet, and NETS had been taking money straight from bank accounts at the till since 1986. What changed after 2017 was reach. By the end of 2025 PayNow had about 11 million registrations, covering more than 90 per cent of adults. This guide sets out the dates and the figures, and follows the hawker-centre push that carried QR payment from the Central Business District to the coffee shop.
PayNow and SGQR at a glance
| What PayNow is | An instant transfer service that links a bank account to a mobile number, NRIC/FIN or, for businesses, a Unique Entity Number (UEN) |
| PayNow launched | 10 July 2017 for individuals; PayNow Corporate followed on 13 August 2018 |
| Operator | The Association of Banks in Singapore, running on the FAST interbank system (live since March 2014) |
| What SGQR is | A single national QR label that can carry several payment schemes; launched in September 2018 with 27 schemes |
| Who drove SGQR | An industry task force co-led by MAS and IMDA |
| Known for | Bringing cashless payment to hawker stalls, coffee shops and small traders without card terminals |
| Today | About 11 million PayNow registrations and some 350,000 businesses at the end of 2025; a PayNow–NETS QR interoperability pilot is targeted for end-2026 |
Before PayNow: FAST, bank wallets and too many QR codes (2014 to 2017)
The plumbing came first. On 17 March 2014 the banks switched on FAST (Fast and Secure Transfers), which moved money between accounts at different banks almost immediately instead of overnight. ABS reported more than 33,000 transactions worth S$64 million in its first two days. FAST still needed the payer to know the recipient’s bank and account number, so it worked better for paying a landlord than for splitting a dinner bill.
Banks and other firms then built wallets on their own rails. DBS PayLah!, launched in 2014, let DBS and POSB customers send money from a phone outside internet banking, with a daily limit of S$999 at the time. Telcos, ride-hailing firms and card schemes followed with wallets and QR codes of their own. Each worked well within its own walls. The trouble showed at the counter: by 2018, according to figures given at the SGQR launch, more than 19,000 versions of payment QR codes were in the market, and a busy stall might display several stickers side by side.
Cash was still the habit. A 2017 PayPal study, cited in a 2021 article in Singapore Management University’s Asian Management Insights, found that nine in ten Singaporeans named cash as their first choice of payment, and a 2016 KPMG report put hawker centres at the top of the places where cash dominated. That was the problem PayNow and SGQR were meant to solve.
10 July 2017: PayNow launches on mobile numbers and NRIC
PayNow’s launch release named seven participating banks: Citibank Singapore, DBS/POSB, HSBC, Maybank, OCBC, Standard Chartered and UOB. The service was free to customers and available round the clock. Instead of an account number, the payer typed in the recipient’s mobile number or NRIC/FIN, and FAST moved the money behind the scenes. ABS counted more than 50,000 registrations by 5pm on the first day.
The early growth was mostly between people rather than at shops: friends settling bills, parents sending pocket money, tenants paying rent. Within months more than a million users had signed up, according to GovTech. Bank of China and ICBC joined later, taking the number of banks offering PayNow to nine by August 2018. For how transfer limits and mistaken transfers work now, see our explainer on PayNow and FAST transfer limits.
What is SGQR, and why was it created in 2018?
Two changes in 2018 turned PayNow from a transfer tool into a way to pay shops. The first was PayNow Corporate, launched on 13 August 2018, which let businesses, charities and government agencies receive PayNow through their UEN. By 10 August 2018, ABS said, PayNow had passed 1.6 million registrations and S$1.2 billion transferred.
The second was SGQR. Ong Ye Kung, then Minister for Education and a member of the MAS board, launched it in September 2018, and MAS and IMDA billed it as the world’s first unified payment QR code. One label could carry PayNow, NETS, GrabPay, Liquid Pay, Singtel Dash and the other participating schemes, 27 in all. The first labels went up in the CBD from late September, with a progressive rollout across Singapore over six months. The label shows the logos of the schemes it accepts, and the customer scans it with whichever of those apps they already use.
By 2019 the habit was spreading fast. Figures released in September 2019 and reported by finews.asia put PayNow at 2.8 million registered accounts, more than 65 per cent of Singaporeans aged 20 to 75, carrying over five million transactions a month. By November 2019 Vulcan Post was reporting more than three million users, 129,000 businesses and over S$12 billion transferred since launch.
How did hawkers start accepting QR payments?
The hawker centre was always the hard case. A plate of noodles costs a few dollars, the queue is impatient, and many stallholders are older and wary of fees. In December 2017 The Asian Banker reported that NETS expected to sign up 30 hawker centres for its NETS QR service by the end of that year and all 120 within six months, and that it was waiving terminal and transaction fees for hawkers for three years. Our reading, rather than a documented finding, is that this is why a QR sticker suited stalls better than a card terminal: it needs no counter space, no power and no rental.
The big push came during the pandemic. On 8 June 2020 the government launched Hawkers Go Digital, run by Enterprise Singapore, IMDA and the SG Digital Office with HDB, JTC and the National Environment Agency. Stallholders who adopted a unified SGQR received S$300 a month for five months, up to S$1,500, if they made at least 20 e-payment transactions of S$1 or more each month. The government also covered transaction fees until the end of 2023.
By July 2020, IMDA said, 5,400 stallholders had adopted e-payment, 1,900 of them in the programme’s first two months. Officers had approached 15,900 stallholders across 700 coffee shops, 112 hawker centres and markets run by the National Environment Agency and 13 HDB markets, with a target of 18,000 by June 2021. The SMU review records PayNow registrations rising by nearly half during 2020, to about 4.9 million. For how paying at a stall works in practice, see how a hawker centre works.
Across borders and into one acquirer: 2021 to 2026
On 29 April 2021 Singapore and Thailand linked PayNow with PromptPay, which the two central banks called the world’s first linkage of real-time payment systems. Customers of participating banks could send up to S$1,000 a day to a Thai mobile number within minutes. Links to Malaysia’s DuitNow and India’s UPI followed, and together the cross-border links carried S$371 million in 2025.
At home, the remaining friction was on the merchant’s side. A single SGQR label still meant separate arrangements with each scheme behind it. In November 2024 NETS rolled out SGQR+ islandwide as a “master acquirer”, so a merchant could accept many schemes through one provider and one set of reports. It started with about 24,000 acceptance points and aimed for more than 35,000, hawker centres included.
In June 2026 MAS and ABS published the first phase of a study called PayNow Generation 2. As reported by Fintech News Singapore, the report put PayNow at about 11 million registrations and some 350,000 businesses at the end of 2025, with S$154 billion in consumer payments and S$147 billion in business payments that year. The headline plan for shoppers is a pilot, targeted for end-2026, that would let a PayNow user scan a NETS QR code and the reverse, so that any app works at any merchant.
Paying by PayNow QR safely today
As of October 2026, most stalls display a static code: you scan it, type in the amount, and your app shows the merchant’s registered name before you confirm. Read that name every time. If it does not match the stall, or a stranger asks you to scan a code to “receive” money, stop. PayNow transfers are instant and hard to reverse, which is exactly why scammers like them.
Two WahLiao explainers cover the protections. Money Lock and banks’ anti-scam features explains how to ring-fence savings so they cannot be transferred out digitally, and our guide to the Shared Responsibility Framework for phishing scams sets out when a bank or telco must share losses. Keep a little cash too; a flat phone battery still ends a QR payment.
A PayNow and SGQR history timeline
- 1986: NETS launches debit payment from bank accounts at retail outlets.
- 17 March 2014: FAST interbank transfers go live.
- 2014: DBS launches the PayLah! mobile wallet.
- 10 July 2017: PayNow launches with seven banks; more than 50,000 sign up on day one.
- December 2017: NETS starts signing hawker centres up for NETS QR, waiving fees for three years.
- 13 August 2018: PayNow Corporate lets businesses receive payment by UEN.
- September 2018: SGQR launches with 27 payment schemes, starting in the CBD.
- 8 June 2020: Hawkers Go Digital offers stallholders up to S$1,500 to adopt SGQR.
- 29 April 2021: PayNow links with Thailand’s PromptPay.
- November 2024: NETS rolls out SGQR+ islandwide.
- June 2026: MAS and ABS publish the PayNow Generation 2 study; a PayNow–NETS QR pilot is targeted for end-2026.
Questions people ask
When was PayNow launched in Singapore?
On 10 July 2017, by the Association of Banks in Singapore, with seven banks taking part. PayNow Corporate, for businesses, followed on 13 August 2018.
When was SGQR introduced?
In September 2018. It combined 27 payment schemes on a single label, and rollout began with merchants in the Central Business District before spreading islandwide over about six months.
What is the difference between PayNow and SGQR?
PayNow is a payment service that moves money between bank accounts using a phone number, NRIC/FIN or UEN. SGQR is the shared QR label a shop displays; PayNow is one of the schemes it can carry, alongside NETS, GrabPay and others.
How many people use PayNow?
About 11 million registrations at the end of 2025, covering more than 90 per cent of adults, plus some 350,000 businesses, according to the 2026 PayNow Generation 2 study by MAS and ABS.
Why do hawker stalls use SGQR?
A QR label costs little and needs no terminal. Uptake jumped after the 2020 Hawkers Go Digital programme paid stallholders up to S$1,500 to adopt a unified SGQR and covered transaction fees until the end of 2023.
Sources and further reading
- Association of Banks in Singapore: ABS announces the launch of PayNow (July 2017)
- Association of Banks in Singapore: Launch of PayNow Corporate (August 2018)
- Association of Banks in Singapore: FAST media release (March 2014)
- IMDA: Singapore introduces world’s first unified payment QR code, SGQR (2018)
- Bangkok Post: Single label to replace 19,000 QR codes in Singapore (September 2018)
- The Asian Banker: Singapore goes more digital through NETS QR code (December 2017)
- IMDA: Good progress for Hawkers Go Digital programme (August 2020)
- Bank of Thailand and MAS: World’s first linkage of real-time payment systems (April 2021)
- Fintech News Singapore: NETS rolls out SGQR+ islandwide (November 2024)
- MAS and ABS: Instant payments enhancements with PayNow Generation 2 study (June 2026)
- Fintech News Singapore: PayNow Gen 2 and QR interoperability (July 2026)
- GovTech: E-payments, guideposts to a Smart Nation (2018)
- Vulcan Post: PayNow adopts SGQR (November 2019)
- finews.asia: Nearly 70 per cent of Singaporeans registered to national e-payment system (September 2019)
- Singapore Management University, Asian Management Insights: Cashing in on disruptions (2021)
This is a historical reference, not payment advice: limits, fees and participating apps change, so check with your bank. Read next: How NETS brought bank-account payment to the till · Cash, coins and exact change in Singapore · Back to The Memory
Leave a Reply