US dollars return to Zim banks and ATMs

Published: 30 November 2017

Information that is circulating online is indicating that the US dollar has made its way back to the economy, TechZim reported.

For some who are out of the country this may seem to be silly news, but for the past few months seeing a $20 note was a rarity that could necessitate the family head to summon everyone in the household to come have a look at it!

The $50 and $100 notes were even more difficult and you stood a better chance of getting a resignation from a President who was in office for 37 years than seeing these notes.

Various tweets, Facebook posts and WhatsApp message circulating are pointing towards not only are banks dishing out US dollars but ATMs have started working again. ATMs working is a big deal, in that most of the financial institutions in the country have been compelling customers to come into their banking halls to access cash, as all they were dolling out were coins.

A look at recent figures from the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe, a paltry $11m only was dispensed in a week from the banks, while $2bn worth of transactions were processed.

The return of the US dollar to the market will make many happy and expectant of reactivation of customer's bank cards being able to make online and external payments out of Zimbabwe.

Talks of black market rates for the greenback going down have been circulating as well, with rates said to be as little as 40% extra, from as high as 90%.

This might be premature celebrations though as just yesterday we published a notification from Barclays that they'll be discontinuing DStv payments, a transaction that most banks require people to pay in US dollars. When banks accept any means of currency from customers and settle DStv in USD then we can bring out the champagne.

Has your bank started issuing USDs? Do you really need US dollars to make local payments? Would it not be better for you to get bond notes that you can transact with locally?
- techzim

Tags: Dollars,