TELECEL Zimbabwe is offering a 10% incentive to its 1,3 million registered users, who use the platform to receive international remittances.
BY TATIRA ZWINOIRA
This comes as cash shortages have shrunk Telecel’s active subscriber base over a 90-day period by 2,3%, with agents facing challenges in cashing out.
“The 10% incentive, which is running for three months, is meant to grow the subscriber base of Telecash and encourage the use of Telecash services like the Telecash debit card (Gold Card), which is ZimSwitch enabled,” the company’s chief executive officer Angeline Vere said.
“This includes other services like bill payments, merchant payments, airtime purchases and the normal person to person transfers. The 10% incentive is a Telecel initiative and not a government or central bank initiative.”
She said the incentive was intended to increase their active subscriber base, increase Telecash transactions and encourage the use of plastic money on their Telecash Debit Gold Card.
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Telecel says the 10% incentive would be to all registered users, who receive international remittances from the Diaspora community to encourage the use of formal channels.
The move to offer the 10% incentive is unprecedented, as the mobile subscriber seeks to gain subscribers, having lost ground to Econet and NetOne.
Vere said funds for the incentive were coming from their normal promotional budgets.
“The 10% incentive like all our other promotions and similar bonus-driven initiatives is based on a sound and thorough business case,” she explained.
“Success for us will be measured by making the market aware of the availability of non-cash options to redeeming your wallet.”
In a statement yesterday, Telecel Zimbabwe head of mobile financial services, Violet Masunda, said the decision to offer a 10% incentive was in line with government’s own efforts to encourage the use of formal channels to receive money from the Diaspora.
“Unregistered recipients will continue to receive the 3% incentive, which is already being offered by the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe. Telecel’s incentive is the first of its kind on the market from a private local entity other than government,” she said.
The central bank says about $1 billion in Diaspora remittances was channelled through informal channels in 2015.
The RBZ’s own remittance drive of 3% incentive, called the Diaspora Remittances Incentives Scheme, was launched last month to discourage the use of informal channels.