SA's top mobile operator, Vodacom, in partnership with Nedbank, will unveil a local version of the Kenyan mobile banking service, M-Pesa, by the end of the month.
M-Pesa has already been popular in other African countries. It enables unbanked customers to transfer money from person-to-person using a cellphone.
It was originally created as a pilot funded jointly by Vodafone and the UK Department for International Development Financial Deepening Challenge Fund.
Since then, the service has been successful in the Kenyan, Tanzanian and Afghanistan markets, gaining more than 10 million customers.
Vodafone first announced its intentions to launch it in SA at the GSMA Mobile World Conference, in Barcelona, earlier this year.
It is estimated that only about 11 million of SA's 49 million people have access to a formal banking environment and have a bank account. However, there are an estimated 30 million prepaid cellphone accounts.
Growth area
Just over 11% of the South African population banks through their mobile phones, a figure that has surpassed the amount of people who have Internet access.
Arthur Goldstuck, MD of World Wide Worx, says cellphone banking will continue to grow faster than online banking. “There is a lot of growth left and cellphone banking will continue to outpace Internet banking. Internet banking won't catch up again.”
Goldstuck points out that there are about five million people online, but close to six million South Africans bank on their mobile devices. He puts the current potential market at about eight million.
In addition, he says, cellphone banking will appeal to people who do not have Internet access, and have to travel great distances to get to a physical bank. These people are likely to be low-income earners.
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