M-Pesa, Tigo Pesa and Airtel Mobile Payments
Alternative Airlines Accepts M-Pesa, Tigo Pesa And Airtel
The UK based OTA Alternative Airlines is now accepting the mobile payments M-Pesa, Tigo Pesa and Airtel to pay for flights.
Shirika la Wasafiri la Juu linakubali M-Pesa, Tigo Pesa na Airtel
This will make Alternative Airlines as one of the only UK based Travel Agencies to accept paying with these mobile payment methods.
Talks took place with Direct Pay Online in July 2017 to have the new payment methods implemented and since launching in August, the methods have been proven a great success for Alternative Airlines. This now adds to the 25 payment options available to use for airline tickets at Alternative Airlines, which include PayPal, PayPal Credit, flight finance options and more.
Why incorporate them?
Alternative Airlines has seen a growing demand from African and Indian customers for the use of M-Pesa, Tigo Pesa and Airtel as it is easier, more straightforward way of paying for flights.
M-Pesa alone has over 18 million active users in Kenya, since it's launch in March 2007 and 614 million transactions were made during December 2016, according to Vodafone, Safaricom report.
According to an IATA Report in 2016, "Payments assuming a greater area of focus. The growth in locally-friendly payments can contribute to making transactions “frictionless” for a larger number of passengers around the world. Payment providers like M-Pesa, Alipay, and PayPal will all become more important by 2021."
Therefore, with a new partnership with Direct Pay Online, an African online payment service platform, Alternative Airlines are able to help many African and Indian travellers to search and pay for flights online.
What is M-Pesa?
M-Pesa Mobile Wallet is a branchless banking service, allowing transfer methods only through mobile phone devices.
Vodafone M-Pesa is a Mobile Wallet service from Vodafone that offers Money Transfer, Bill & Utility Pay, Merchant payments and Business Solutions (Enterprise Cash Management) enabling instant transfer and receipt of money anytime, from anywhere.
M-Pesa allows users to deposit, withdraw, transfer money and pay for goods and services easily with a mobile device. Other services include financing and micro-financing. M-Pesa was launched in 2007 by Vodafone for Safaricom and Vodacom, the largest mobile network operators in Kenya and Tanzania.
What is Tigo Pesa?
Tigo Pesa offers the possibilitiy to get services to communities in Tanzania that are most at risk, in districts that are complex to reach.
With Tigo Pesa you can send and receive money with more people and businesses than you can with any other service – including all M-Pesa and Airtel Money users.
What is Airtel?
Airtel is India's leading telecommunications company, contributing to India economic resurgence and reformation. It is India's first mobile payment banking system, allowing customers to pre or post pay bills or transfer money.
What are Mobile Payments?
Whether it is booking travel, buying online, paying back loans, or sending money to friends and family, payments need to be made. Mobile payments make that process efficient and effective. Instead of cash and credit cards, mobile payments allow customers to use a mobile device, which they carry everywhere, to pay for goods and services.
In the African travel industry, mobile payments simplify the reservation process by enabling users with a mobile money account in any country to instantly make travel purchases in their home and foreign countries.
Benefit of Mobile Payment Solutions
Ability to Provide Financial Services
Mobile payments are a great solution for providing financial services to the unbanked population of the world (estimated at 50% of the world’s adult population, according to Financial Access’ 2009 Report “Half the World is Unbanked”). Because 70% of Africa now has mobile phones and banks in this part of the world are inaccessible to most of the population, mobile payment solutions are an effective way to supply the banking services needed by the people.
Sophie Georgalakis, Alternative Airlines, UK
Created: 6th October 2017
Updated: 27th June 2019
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