Client Name

Pakistan State Oil (PSO)

Faculty Advisor

Dr. Atizaz Ahsan

SBS Thought Leadership Areas

Investment Decision Making

SBS Thought Leadership Area Justification

This ELP project falls under the IBA School of Business Studies' Investment Decision Making thought leadership category. Three reasons support this classification:

  1. PSO can use this study to determine how best to allocate resources for their payment systems. It also shows which channels offer higher returns on investment by contrasting bank and private cards. The company can use these information to guide decisions on purchasing terminals, creating programs and collaborating with banks.
  2. The regional concentration analysis and performance index help quantify how much PSO is missing by not fully using underpenetrated markets like Peshawar, Multan and Faisalabad. This info guides making wise capital allocation decisions throughout PSO's network. The concentration analysis can also be used to strengthens existing core regions like South, North and Central. 
  3. The Digicash consumer economics analysis reveals that while each registered account earns PKR 12,237 it decreases by 11.2% every five years. This information provides us with the financial perspective required to determine whether it is preferable to create new programs or reactivate existing clients. This facilitates the payment system strategy's application of those investment choice models.

Aligned SDGs

GOAL 8: Decent Work and Economic Growth

Aligned SDGs Justification

Three UN Sustainable Development Goals are supported by this project. This project offers suggestions for improving PSO outlet payment systems. Hence it supports SDG 8 of Decent Work and Economic Growth. This reduces wait times and increases gasoline station efficiency. This benefits fleet managers, transportation companies and consumers alike.  Additionally, the initiative supports Industry, Innovation, and Infrastructure SDG 9. It investigates the use of digital payments at petrol stations. It also recommends using cutting edge technology like mobile wallets and QR codes. PSO is the largest over the counter fuel supplier in Pakistan. Their decisions have a significant impact on the nation's digital payment system.

Third, SDG 17 of Partnerships for the Goals applies because the study looks at the PSO bank card partnership model. It is suggesting ways to expand acquiring bank relationships and multi channel payment acceptance. Building strong institutional ties is key for PSO. They must keep up with the trend of digital payments growing in Pakistan's fuel retail business.

NDA

Yes

Abstract

The card based payment systems at petrol retail stations owned by Pakistan State Oil Company are compared in this experiential learning project. Six regional markets and six proprietary card schemes use transactional data from FY2021 to FY2025. Five specific objectives are outlined in the Terms of Reference. Profile transaction behavior by type of card. Analyze customer usage habits. Identify impractical concentration at stations. Contextualize PSO card growth trajectories against credit and debit cards nationally. And develop operational and strategic recommendations based on this analysis. The research places internal payment dynamics in relation to national payment data as reported by the State Bank of Pakistan. Descriptive analysis, program level segmentation, geographic concentration analysis, ANOVA, Pearson correlation, growth decomposition, customer segmentation and station segmentation by payment mix and transaction load are all included in the multi layered analytical framework. Every methodological element is in line with the eight-week ELP analysis plan and the project's Terms of Reference.

The analysis has seven key findings. First, compared to bankissued cards, PSO proprietary cards generate 2.84 times more revenue. Approximately 18 million PSO card transactions and 6.3 million bank card transactions occur annually in the same locations. Subsequently, revenue increased significantly during the course of five years, rising by 99% from PKR 97 billion to PKR 193 billion. Pricing initially drove this increase, but following a significant shift in FY 2024–2025, volume gains are now driving growth. Finally, the clientele is become increasingly institutional. At CAGR rates of 28.6% and 39.8%, respectively, the Fleet and Corporate programs also experienced substantial growth. Fourth, the Commercial program has plateaued and Digicash is in structural decline with revenue per registered customer down 11.2% over five years. Only in the fifth Peshawar region do bank cards outperform PSO proprietary cards, which is a strategic anomaly. Sixth, premium fuel HO97-Euro5 is growing at a 21.5% CAGR faster than the overall portfolio. Seventh, as the digital payments infrastructure grew exponentially in Pakistan, the share of national POS transaction value for PSO decreased from 21.4% to 9.2%.

There are nine strategic recommendations within three categories. These are terminal reliability standards, institutional service protocols and diversification of bank cards for operational efficiency. Payment mix optimisation covers Digicash reactivation, Commercial services growth and QR payment integration. Regional expansion includes deploying resources to Peshawar and Multan, as well as conducting a study of the North area. This research helps us better understand the fuel retail proprietary and open loop card ecosystems. This is especially important in developing economies that are rapidly digitizing.

Document Type

Restricted Access

Document Name for Citation

Experiential Learning Project

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Available for download on Saturday, June 07, 2031

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