Business

Airtel removes 7-day limit for accessing money from competing networks

A file picture of Airtel Kenya Managing Director Ashish Malhotra. (Photo: Airtel Kenya)

By Saleem Abdi | Thursday, February 8, 2024

Airtel Kenya hopes the change expands its mobile money market.

Airtel Money customers will be able to access funds sent to their mobile money wallets from other networks beyond seven days, as has been the case, in a new development that removes that validity period for them to withdraw the money.

Customers have in the past been forced to withdraw money sent from different networks within a week, failure of which it would automatically be reverted to the sender’s account.

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In a statement on Thursday, Airtel Kenya said that as part of the Central Bank of Kenya (CBK) pursuit to implement the National Payments Strategy 2022- 2025, the validity period had been removed. Its customers can therefore access their money without the requirement of a code that was only active for seven days.

Airtel Kenya hopes the change expands its mobile money market.

“The new streamlined process supported by the CBK is very welcome and a big benefit to Kenyans as customers will now enjoy seamless experiences at affordable costs when sending money across networks, regardless of the channel,” said Airtel Money Managing Director Anne Kinuthia-Otieno.

“Sending money is the biggest use case in Kenya so having a seamless, direct wallet-to-wallet transfer of money across networks is a big benefit."

Mobile network operators are expected to collaborate for the new development to work.

The CBK has been pursuing a national payments strategy that aims to boost the interoperability of mobile network operators.

The development of cross-network mobile money operations follows a similar move that addressed charges when customers make cross-network calls. The CBK pushed companies to reduce the charges they imposed on each other under such circumstances.

“With these changes, a customer registered on any mobile money platform can now send money directly to the recipient's wallet. This will apply to any amount as low as Sh1 and as high as Sh250,000 per transaction daily,” the company said.

Airtel Kenya Managing Director Ashish Malhotra noted that the change would lead to expansion of the mobile money market in the country.

“This is a major benefit for Kenyans as they can now enjoy the convenience of real-time transactions, which has cut out limiting user intermediary steps,” Malhotra said.