Skip to main content

Visa and Halotel bring secure and convenient mobile payments for Tanzanians


Visa, the global payments technology company, has announced a strategic partnership with Halotel to enable Visa on mobile payments on Halotel’s HaloPesa wallet in Tanzania. 

The service will be rolled out in early 2019 thereby enabling HaloPesa’s one million registered wallet holders to use Visa on mobile to securely make merchant payments and conduct cash deposits and withdrawals at Visa agents. Any HaloPesa customer, including those who do not have a bank account, will be able to benefit from the solution. The aim is to connect more Tanzanians to the global payment system, bringing secure and convenient mobile commerce for consumers and merchants. 

“We are excited about this partnership with a key mobile service provider such as Halotel. Our partnership with Halotel will ensure that Tanzanians can pay using Visa on their mobiles at over 40,000 new retailers. It will also help expand financial inclusion for Tanzanian consumers who will now be able to benefit from participating in the Visa eco-system", said Visa acting General Manager for East Africa, Kevin Langley.

Halotel is the fastest growing mobile network operator in Tanzania and started operations in 2015. In 3 years, Halotel has gained 4 million subscribers with 1 million mobile money accounts branded HaloPesa and 40,000 mobile money agents.

“We are proud to partner with Visa on this initiative. With this partnership, we will have the power of the Visa network to deliver interoperable standards and enable our customers to pay and get paid seamlessly.” said Halotel’s Deputy Managing Director Nguyen Van Son.

Through the partnership, HaloPesa will offer consumers the option to pay a merchant with interoperable Visa QR Codes that are being rolled out as part of Visa on mobile expansion in the market. 

Visa on mobile enables consumers to access their funds directly from their bank accounts via their mobile banking app to pay merchants, send money to individuals at no transaction fee, as well as deposit, or withdraw cash at any Visa agent.  

Enrolled merchants will receive a unique QR code with a Till Number that customers can scan using a smartphone or key enter using a feature phone respectively to make the payments. The funds move directly from the consumer’s bank account into the merchant’s account and provides real-time notification to both parties. 

Enrolled bank agents will also receive a QR code with a Till Number that consumers can scan using a smartphone or key in a USSD code from a feature phone respectively to deposit or withdraw funds into or from enabled bank accounts. 

This partnership reinforces Visa’s commitment to expand mobile payments acceptance worldwide.

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Column: Caleb Otieno: Make empathy a reflex

‘Empathy is about standing in someone else 's shoes, feeling with his or her heart, seeing with his or her eyes. Reflection is the means of processing thoughts and feelings about an activity, incident, or day. It gives us a chance to come to terms with our thoughts and feelings surrounding it”  People who understand how to watch, listen and observe the actions and emotions of those around them are often perceived as the most successful in life. A conscious alignment of one’s self with others starts with the development of empathy in the early years.  In the early years of life from age two to seven, young children are naturally ego-centric and are very much inclined to think mostly about themselves and their immediate needs. They are not yet ready to consider the needs and feelings of others. Developing a sense of empathy is an important developmental process for young children. It is at the heart of good relationships, and it begins with valuing others and their perspectives.  Tea

New Research Finds Corner Shops are Faring Well Against Big Box Stores in Emerging Markets

Today,   Flourish Ventures   released a new research report showing that corner shops are doing better than predicted despite protracted supply chain issues and big-box and online retail competitors. The study confirmed better-than-expected sales and that 94% of consumers surveyed plan to shop as much or more at their corner shops in the future. Both shopkeepers and customers believe, however, that corner stores will need to accelerate digital technology adoption to remain relevant and competitive.                                                                                                                                                   The  2022 Digitizing the Corner Shop  research report, published by Flourish, a global fintech investor in partnership with Bain & Company and 60 Decibels, elevates the voices of more than 800 shopkeepers and 800 of their customers in Brazil, Egypt, India, and Indonesia. These primary research findings and accompanying Flourish analysis provide

Novo Nordisk opens regional office in Kenya

From left: Pharmacy and Poisons Board CEO Dr Fred Siyoi, Denmark Deputy Ambassador to Kenya Henrik Larsen and Novo Nordisk's Vice President (Business Area Africa and Gulf) Mads Bo Larsen during the opening of Novo Nordisk's Nairobi Office Novo Nordisk, a global healthcare company headquartered in Denmark with more than 95 years of innovation and leadership in diabetes care has opened a regional office in Nairobi, Kenya. Medicine is their key contribution and they supply nearly half of the world’s insulin. However, it takes more than medicine to defeat diabetes. The company, therefore, works in partnerships to drive change to defeat diabetes. Some of the key projects in Kenya include the Base of the Pyramid (BoP) project that works to improve access to diabetes care for people at the base of the economic pyramid and the Changing Diabetes® in Children (CDiC) programme that aims to bring all elements of necessary diabetes care closer to the children and build capacity for