Safaricom and Visa recently introduced the first M-PESA GlobalPay Visa Virtual card.
The launch of the new M-PESA Visa virtual card opens global shopping for Kenyan consumers, allowing secure cashless payments at merchant locations in over 200 countries through Visa’s global network.
The M-PESA GlobalPay Visa Virtual Card will be exclusive for international, online payments outside the country to protect customers from incurring forex conversion costs on local online payments billed in Kenya Shillings.
Once a customer performs a transaction with the card, they will receive an SMS with the prevailing exchange rate for the transaction value. Transactions will be subject to current M-PESA limits of KES 150,000 per transaction and KES 300,000 per day at the prevailing Forex rates.
The M-PESA GlobalPay VISA Virtual card is a timely service tailored to meet the increasing needs of Kenyans using global apps and shopping websites for entertainment, retail, business and even when travelling abroad.
In addition to providing customers with the freedom and convenience of transacting across the world, the M-PESA GlobalPay Visa virtual card builds on M-PESA’s security by empowering customers to generate a unique CVV for a 30-minute period. Customers will key in their M-PESA PIN each time they generate a CVV. This feature ensures all the details of the card required to perform a transaction are only known to the customer.
The M-PESA GlobalPay Visa Virtual Card will gradually be available across other M-PESA markets through the M-PESA Super App under a strategic partnership between M-PESA Africa and Visa. These include Tanzania, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Mozambique, Lesotho and Ghana.
Peter Ndegwa, CEO, Safaricom
M-PESA has over the past fifteen years evolved from a simple money transfer service to become a robust payment platform and driver of financial inclusion for Kenyans. This has paved the way for numerous innovative services and by partnering with Visa to provide the M-PESA GlobalPay Visa virtual card, we are looking to bridge the gap for our customers who would like to use M-PESA anywhere across the world.
Corine Mbiaketcha, VP and GM for East Africa at Visa
Visa is committed to expanding the payments ecosystem across Africa by opening up the global marketplace for every single consumer. This partnership with Safaricom is an important step in helping to achieve this.
