Standards/namqr
NAMQR
Overview
NAMQR (Namibia Quick Response Code Standard) is Namibia's national QR payment standard and a registered trademark. The Bank of Namibia (BoN) calls it "the single national technical specification for QR-based payments" in the National Payment System (NPS) 2. Version 5.0 of the NAMQR Code Standards was finalised and published on 9 May 2025 1, 2. It is a tag-length-value (TLV) payload based on the EMVCo QR Code standards and the Instant Payment Programme's QR specification, among other inputs 1, 2. It covers static and dynamic codes, presented by the payee (merchant) or by the payer 2. In October 2026 it is a published specification without scheme rules: BoN said in December 2025 that the rules, operating guidelines and a phased migration of existing QR products would be worked out during 2026 2. The Namibia country report covers the wider landscape Namibia report.
History
- NPS Vision 2025. The NPS Vision named QR codes as one of the global system megatrends for the industry to explore 3. The NPS Vision and Strategy (2021–2025), under Theme 3 "Consumer-Centric Innovation", recorded the industry's need for standardised QR codes 2.
- 25 October 2023: guidelines. Governor Johannes !Gawaxab signed the Guidelines on the Standardisation of Quick Response Codes in the National Payment System under the Payment System Management Act, 2023 (Act No. 14 of 2023), effective on the date of signature 3. BoN's later guidance note dates their publication to 1 November 2023 2. The guidelines took a "hybrid approach": BoN gives guidance and the industry writes the standard, which needs BoN approval 3. They asked users of proprietary QR codes to migrate to interoperable ones by 30 June 2024, and said that without industry alignment BoN would mandate a standard. Section 6.1(a) gives July 2024 for that mandate and section 6.2(g) gives October 2024 3.
- May 2024: the instant-payment link. NPCI International Payments (NIPL), the international arm of the National Payments Corporation of India, signed an agreement with BoN to help it build an instant payment system "like" India's UPI 7. NAMQR's signed-QR annex describes this Instant Payment Programme (IPP) as "a version of UPI operated by NPCI in India" 1.
- January–May 2025: drafting. Industry stakeholders worked with the Payments Association of Namibia (PAN) and BoN from January 2025 to "co-craft and finalise" the standard 2. Version 5.0 lists its last update as 11 April 2025, and its cover is dated 9 May 2025 1. The changes in 5.0 included a new section on using NAMQR across stores of value and payment streams, and a tag for discounts and cashback 1.
- 11 December 2025: guidance note. BoN published the Guidance Note on the Operationalisation of NAMQR Code Standards, which sets out the next phase: scheme rules (use cases, user journeys, payload parameters, functional specifications, test cases and a "translator" between payment systems), operating guidelines, and a go-to-market plan with a phased move of existing QR solutions 2.
- July 2026: PAN annual report. PAN's 2025 annual report said the NamQR standard was finalised. At its launch BoN Deputy Governor Leonie Dunn named operationalising NamQR as one of the priorities under NPS Vision 2030 6.
Technical specification
NAMQR is a payment payload carried in an ordinary QR Code symbol. The spec describes payload format and content only; app processing, network messages and user journeys are out of scope 1.
Data structure. Each data object is a TLV triple: a two-digit numeric tag (00–99), a two-digit length (01–99) and a value of 1 to 99 characters. Tag 00 (Payload Format Indicator) comes first and tag 63 (CRC) last; all other objects may appear in any order, and a reading app must accept any order 1. Value formats are N, A, AN, ANS or S 1. The payload should not exceed 512 alphanumeric characters 1.
| Tag | Object | Notes from the spec 1 |
|---|---|---|
| 00 | Payload Format Indicator | 01 in this version. 99 (or similar) switches to EMVCo's customer-presented card chip data format |
| 01 | Point of Initiation Method | 11 payee-presented static, 12 payee-presented dynamic, 13 payer-presented static, 14 payer-presented dynamic |
| 02–16 | Card network templates | Visa, Mastercard, Namibia domestic card scheme, NAMQR operator, Discover, American Express, JCB, UnionPay |
| 17 | Existing Namibian payment system (payee) | Reverse-domain GUI (example na.com.namclear.nrtc), payee PSP id, payee identifier such as a mobile number |
| 26, 27 | IPP payee templates | Tag 26: IPP "full form alias" (contains @), org id, merchant id, minimum amount. Tag 27: transaction reference, reference URL and its category |
| 28, 29 | Payer-presented templates | The same split for the payer (existing system or IPP alias) |
| 52 | Merchant Category Code | ISO 18245. Non-zero for merchants, 0000 for person-to-person and payer-presented codes |
| 53, 54 | Currency, amount | ISO 4217 numeric. Amount up to 13 characters, 2 decimals |
| 55–57 | Tip or convenience fee | Indicator, fixed fee, percentage fee |
| 58–61 | Country, name, city, postal code | Name up to 25 characters, city up to 15 |
| 62, 64 | Additional data, alternate-language template | |
| 65 | Token Vault Unique Identifier | Mandatory in static and dynamic codes. A footnote says NamClear proposed its 8-digit NREF reference as its identifier |
| 66 | Digital signature | Mandatory for domestic IPP app-based payments, optional elsewhere |
| 67–79 | RFU for EMVCo | |
| 80 | Unreserved template (mandatory) | GUI plus an Initiation Mode: static, secure, mandate, dynamic, ATM QR and online variants, with codes from 01 to 24 |
| 81–84 | Unreserved templates (conditional) | Fields from the IPP deep-linking specifications, including invoice data and an expiry date and time (tag 82) |
| 63 | CRC | ISO/IEC 13239, polynomial 1021, initial value FFFF, written as 4 uppercase hex characters, e.g. 6304007B |
Aliases, not accounts. A NAMQR identifies the payee by an alias (a mobile number or another surrogate the PSP assigns). The payee's PSP resolves it to a bank, e-money or card account, so the code itself carries no account number 1.
Token Vault. The PSP that creates a code sends its parameters to a Token Vault, which returns the identifier placed in tag 65. The payer's PSP checks the scanned parameters against the vault before payment, and a mismatch (merchant identifier, amount and so on) is declined 1. BoN may run one common vault as national infrastructure, allow proprietary vaults, or both 1.
Signed QR. For app-based IPP payments, the annex describes UPI-style signed codes. The QR string is signed with ECDSA and SHA-256 and the signature is Base64-encoded. Public keys are held in IPP's "verified address entries", and an unsigned code must trigger a warning on the payer's app 1.
Symbol encoding. Section 4.13 requires Byte mode for all data, with no Alphanumeric, Numeric, Kanji, Structured Append or FNC1 mode. Characters beyond the Alphanumeric Special set need an ECI designator of 000026 (UTF-8) 1. The spec recommends error-correction level M or Q and calls "Level M with Versions 3 to 5" typical 1. The scanning app must validate the CRC and ask for a re-scan if it fails 1.
Use cases
The spec maps tags to use cases and illustrates them with flows. None of these was found in live NAMQR service in 2026.
- Merchant payments. Static and dynamic merchant-presented codes at a point of sale, including payment from a bank account on an EFT stream (NRTC, EnCR) to a merchant on the card stream through an "interoperable switch" 1.
- Person-to-person and request to pay. Payee-presented codes using a smartphone app or USSD, and payer-presented request-to-pay codes 1.
- Cardless ATM cash withdrawal. The ATM shows a dynamic NAMQR, and the customer scans it with any IPP app and authorises with an IPP PIN 1.
- Other examples in the spec. Agent cash-out, direct-to-home (DTH) payments, international merchant payments, subscriptions with a mandate, digital cash vouchers as gifts, and recurring person-to-person mandates. Tag 80's Purpose codes include NAMFISA, travel, hospitality, insurance, education, metro and non-metro ATMs, corporate disbursement and government vouchers 1.
Implementations
No open-source NAMQR encoder or decoder was found. The specification describes itself as the foundation for scheme rules, operating guidelines and a phased migration that had not been written by December 2025 2.
The rail most NAMQR flows assume is the Instant Payment Solution (IPS), operated by Instant Payments Namibia (IPN), a BoN subsidiary. IPN finished a live pilot with Bank Windhoek, Nampost and Letshego Bank Namibia, announced on 12 June 2026, and named NIPL as its technology partner. Its phased rollout starts with government-to-person social grant payments, and other use cases follow later 4. In February 2026 IPN said person-to-person, business-to-person and e-wallet interoperability would be rolled out in phases over the next 18 months 5. These releases do not mention QR codes 4, 5.
Existing QR products in Namibia, such as PayToday QR, are proprietary closed-loop codes. BoN's guidance note says NAMQR exists to remove the inefficiency of "proprietary QR Codes that are fragmented and closed-loop" 2.
Comparison
| NAMQR (NA) | EMVCo MPM | NQR by NamClear (NA) | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Point of initiation | 11–14, including payer-presented 1 |
11 static, 12 dynamic. Other values RFU (Hong Kong's EMVCo-based profile) 8 |
— |
| Interoperability (per NAMQR spec) | Card rails, existing payment streams and IPP 1 | Within card rails only 1 | Card rails, existing streams and IPP 1 |
| Key security feature (per NAMQR spec) | CRC, optional certified Token Vault, signed QR for IPP apps 1 | CRC 1 | Token Vault 1 |
| Use-case score in the NAMQR spec | 14/14 1 | 3/14 1 | 9/14 1 |
The scores come from NAMQR's own authors, not from an independent review. "NQR" here is NamClear's existing Namibian specification, not Nigeria's NQR.
When to choose which. NAMQR keeps the EMVCo TLV layout, tag 00/63 framing and card network templates, so EMVCo parsers can read its envelope 1. It adds what EMVCo merchant-presented mode leaves out: payer-presented codes, mandates, vouchers and ATM withdrawals, plus a Token Vault check against tampering 1. Its IPP templates and signed QR follow India's UPI QR model. The spec cites the "UPI Linking Specification" as a reference 1.
Fun facts
- The spec grades itself. Its comparison table gives NAMQR 14 out of 14 use cases, NamClear's NQR 9 and EMVCo 3 1.
- Two encoding rules. Section 4.12(h) recommends Numeric followed by Alphanumeric in combined mode to shorten the bit stream. Section 4.13 says all data must use Byte mode and that Alphanumeric and Numeric modes "shall not be used" 1.
- Two signing algorithms. The signed-QR annex says the merchant app signs the hashed QR content with "SHA256 with RSA", while the key pair it specifies, and the next step, use ECDSA with SHA-256 1.
- Missed dates. The 2023 guidelines asked for migration away from proprietary QR codes by 30 June 2024 3. The standard itself was published in May 2025, and its scheme rules were still planned for 2026 2.
- "Internal" footer. The published PDF carries the header "Office Use Only\Internal April 2025" on its pages 1.
Status
Published, not yet operational. Version 5.0 (9 May 2025) is the current specification on BoN's site 1. BoN's December 2025 guidance note made scheme rules, operating guidelines and the go-to-market plan the subject of a consultation in 2026 2. In July 2026 PAN reported the standard as finalised, and BoN listed operationalising NamQR as a priority under NPS Vision 2030 6. No published scheme rules, mandate date or live NAMQR acceptance were found as of 19 October 2026.
Sources
- 1 NAMQR Code Standards, Version 5.0 — Bank of Namibia, accessed 2026
- 2 Guidance Note on the Operationalisation of NAMQR Code Standards in the National Payment System — Bank of Namibia, accessed 2026
- 3 Guidelines on the Standardisation of Quick Response Codes in the National Payment System — Bank of Namibia, accessed 2026
- 4 Namibia's Instant Payment Solution successfully completes pilot testing ahead of phased go-live — Instant Payments Namibia, accessed 2026
- 5 Instant Payments Namibia welcomes Minister's support for national payment transformation — Instant Payments Namibia, accessed 2026
- 6 Namibia moves closer to instant payments — Market Watch / Network Media Hub, accessed 2026
- 7 NPCI International to support Namibia develop instant payment system like UPI — BusinessWorld, accessed 2026
- 8 Common QR Code Specification for Retail Payments in Hong Kong (Merchant-Presented Mode) — Hong Kong Monetary Authority working group, accessed 2026
Deployments
Found in the following country reports (grep across reports/countries/):
- NA — NA-namibia.md