- Firm will work alongside Compagnie Financière du Congo, or CFC for short
- New service will be based around CFC’s FlashApp and WU’s global network
- “We are confident that the bridging of digital and physical payment options is going to drive significant change for our customers in Africa,” said a WU spokesperson
Major international money transfer firm Western Union has announced that it will expand its services in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (or DRC).
The firm said it would work alongside a company called Compagnie Financière du Congo, which is known as CFC for short and which is, like Western Union, a money transfer firm.
As part of the new collaboration, the firms will provide over 4,000 Flash Mobile wallet agents with what is needed to offer cross border payments.
This comes from FlashApp, a mobile wallet service already offered by CFC.
Once a payment is made via the new service, it will be paid out using Western Union’s international network of agents, wallets and more.
According to Mohamed Touhami El Ouazzani, who is the regional vice president for Africa at Western Union, the move will help “scale global money movement”.
“We are pleased to lead innovation by integrating our platforms to scale global money movement and we congratulate CFC/Flash for breaking new boundaries,” he said.
“We are confident that the bridging of digital and physical payment options is going to drive significant change for our customers in Africa,” he added.
He went on to highlight how the partnership will “spur a world of new possibilities for CFC/Flash’s money transfer agents, bringing them the opportunity to serve millions of customers with a single wallet”.
“We are excited to support the ever-growing economic integration and digitization of Africa by enabling the shift of high-potential African countries such as the Democratic Republic of the Congo into outbound remittance markets,” he added.
With regards to Flash International, the firm associated with CFC, CEO Jonathan Johannessen explained just how in-demand his firm is.
“CFC/FLASH has helped millions of Congolese establish financial services over the counter. More than 1 million transactions are processed over Flash monthly, providing indirect agent jobs for a growing community of 4,000 Flash Wallet agents,” he said.
“By integrating Western Union money transfer services in Flash wallets, we aim to enable a world of opportunity for Congolese by making it easy and convenient for them to connect with the world,” he added.
Despite the pandemic, Western Union is still working hard. And it’s perhaps little surprise that the firm has chosen to expand in this particular part of Sub-Saharan Africa, either.
Given that the DRC has a strong tradition of migration due to economic problems, war and other issues, there’s clearly a strong market here – and is likely to be for a long time to come.
If you’d like to know more about all that’s going on in the cross border payments sector, you can head over to our magazine pages and read the articles to be found there.
