To coax hawkers to go cashless, e-payment giant Nets is going to enlist the help of an unconventional army: ComfortDelGro's 15,000 cabbies.

The cabbies will get a "monetary reward" for every hawker they get to sign up to use the Nets QR code system.

Nets declined to disclose details of the reward yesterday during the announcement of the tie-up.

This Hawker Champion programme is now being tested by 100 cabbies, and will be rolled out to the full fleet in the next few months.

The tie-up will help hasten the national effort to get more transactions to go cashless.

As part of the tie-up, Nets is also giving the cabbies as well as staff of ComfortDelGro a Nets FlashPay card with a stored value of $5.

They will receive the card after they download the NetsPay app.

Explaining the reason for roping in cabbies to coax hawkers, Nets chief executive Jeffrey Goh said: "Ask any taxi driver for food recommendations and he'll be able to point you to his favourite hawker stalls all over Singapore.

"Hence, we thought cabbies would be the perfect ambassadors to help us reach out to their favourite hawkers and encourage them to embrace cashless payments since the drivers themselves are familiar with Nets QR payments."

Taxi driver Tham Yuet Kok, 69, who is in the trial group, said he appreciates the convenience of cashless payments, having gone from cash to credit cards and now, cardless payments.

He added: "But I also fully understand the concerns hawkers may have, and can share my experience with them."