According to Nyasinga Onyancha, CEO for SimbaPay, the move is in line with the company’s goal of connecting all Africans living abroad to any Mobile Money wallet or Bank Account in Africa/FILE
NAIROBI, Kenya, Feb 29 – African digital money transfer company SimbaPay has announced its plans to expand its services to five new European Union countries.
In a statement, SimbaPay says that it is taking its services to France, Germany, Ireland, Italy and Spain.
According to Nyasinga Onyancha, CEO for SimbaPay, the move is in line with the company’s goal of connecting all Africans living abroad to any Mobile Money wallet or Bank Account in Africa.
“We’re quite pleased to deliver this to Africans in the EU and partner banks in Africa that have been requesting we expand the service to these new territories,” he said.
Africans living in these EU countries will therefore be able to send money back home instantly and free of charge while the money will be credited instantly at the destination mobile money wallet, merchant or bank account.
To send money via SimbaPay, Africans living in the EU with a bank account or debit card simply need to download the SimbaPay app from the Apple AppStore or Google Play and proceed to make money transfers straight from any mobile phone, tablet or computer.
Apart from sending money direct to mobile money services such as M-Pesa, customers can also send money to bank accounts in Africa and to Pay Bill merchants such as schools and utility companies among others.
SimbaPay’s move comes at a time when the World Bank has reviled that Africans abroad currently send home an estimated US$64 billion annually which is more than double the US$30 billion that it receives in Foreign Aid.
At the same time, the company is gearing up to expand into another six countries by the end of March 2016.
Last year, the company became the first platform worldwide to allow Kenyans living abroad make M-Pesa PayBill payments.
Additionally, it launched free and instant transfers to all Nigerian banks last year.
