- The Co-operative Bank of Kenya has announced that it will work alongside the well-known online money transfer company Thunes to offer cheaper payments.
- The news comes after Thunes, which is based in Singapore, received around US$60m in Series B investment funding.
- The bank, which has close to nine million clients, said that it will call the new product offering ‘Co-opRemit’.
One of Kenya’s leading banks has announced that it will work with the online money transfer provider Thunes to offer improved payments processes.
The Co-operative Bank of Kenya said that it will work with Thunes to offer cheaper and easier payments.
It is going to target the small to medium-sized business scene across the African continent, it said.
It intends to provide a product called ‘Co-opRemit’ to customers in the important region.
Co-opRemit will offer simpler money movement that is cheaper for the person or institution placing the transaction.
It is believed that the new service will be versatile in terms of access points and usage.
Customers of Co-opRemit will have the option of placing money transfers from over 150 physical places across the country.
Later in the process, there will be an expansion to internet banking as well as mobile device banking.
In a statement to the press, the chief executive officer of Thunes said that the move will push up the number of payments routes for customers.
Peter De Caluwe said that the company was “delighted” to collaborate with the major Kenyan bank.
“We are delighted to support Co-operative Bank of Kenya in their drive to increase and improve cross-border payment options for their customers,” he said.
On the Co-operative Bank of Kenya’s part, a senior figure there said that the buying and selling of goods and services will now become more “efficient” due to the partnership.
William Ndumia, who is the director of retail & business banking, also emphasised that the cost was likely to become cheaper as a result of the new move.
“With Co-opRemit [SMBs], who are one of our key customer segments, can now look forward to a more efficient trading experience with seamless international payments at affordable rates,” Ndumia said.
Thunes is a payments network that works primarily in emerging markets around the world, specialising in business-to-business transactions.
At the moment, it works in over 100 nations around the world and operates in around 60 global currencies.
It is based in Singapore.
It hit the headlines earlier in the year when it was revealed that it had secured around US$60m in Series B investment funding.
The Co-operative Bank of Kenya, meanwhile, has close to nine million clients on its books.
These include a range of institutions such as financial firms, co-operative societies and private retail customers.
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