Mobile money transactions see 20% growth in mid 2016

quist

August 11, 2016 12:56 AM

This figure represent a 20% growth for the mid-year figure, compared to the 547.96 million Ghana Cedis recorded for the end of 2015.

Mobile money transactions in Ghana have reached a total of 679.17 million Ghana Cedis.

The impressive growth notwithstanding, the 20% penetration rate of mobile money in Ghana has still been described as inadequate by players in the telecom and financial sectors of the economy.

Apart from the penetration challenge, there seems to be lingering friction between the banks and the telcos as to the proper channels through which mobile money receipts lodged with the banks must be disbursed.

While the telcos insist that the monies must be disbursed through them, given them the opportunity to conveniently take their service charges and pay vendors their facilitation fees as the BOG stipulates, the banks prefer to release monies to the customers directly.

This notwithstanding, some stakeholders from the telecom industry have lauded the contributions of the Bank of Ghana in developing strategies to effectively regulate the country’s mobile money market.

According to the General Manager for mobile financial services at MTN, Eli Hini, not only has the central bank worked to enforce the implementation of the regulations introduced in 2015 to guide the financial industry, but the regulator’s commitment to the changing phases of the mobile money market has contributed to increased patronage.

“The Central Bank has so far been supportive since the introduction of the new guidelines; they have introduced a new portal and provided training just so that we all can keep track of what is happening because reporting is important,” Eli Hini said.

quist