HomeSend, has received the 2015 “Best Payment Product in Africa” award at the Asian Banker Middle East and Africa Awards.
The award recognizes payment products that efficiently enable secure, end-to-end transactions for customers, utilizing innovative channels or devices. HomeSend is an international transfer hub created by MasterCard, eServGlobal andBICS and is one of the world’s most extensive cross-border money transfer networks.
“We are extremely honoured to receive this prestigious award,” Stephen Doyle, Group Head and CEO, HomeSend said.
“This award recognizes the strides we are making in providing a convenient, safe, and cost effective money transfer channel to Africans, many of whom are unbanked and underbanked.
The company says for millions of Africans, the receipt of funds from friends and family living abroad is an important lifeline.
Remittances are an integral contributor to the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) of various African economies. In fact, the World Bank Remittances Brief estimates that remittances to Sub-Saharan Africa are expected to increase from $ 33 billion in 2014 to $ 34 billion in 2015.
“Africans abroad are increasingly playing an important role in the development of many African countries through remittances. However, the cost of remitting money to Africa remains high, with a large proportion of remittances being sent informally in cash. By digitizing and formalizing remittance payments, we are helping to create new remittance corridors, expand the scope of cashless money transfers, extend financial inclusion and support economic growth,” Doyle added.
Currently, HomeSend has live deployments in 50 countries and commercial contracts with mobile network operators and money transfer operators (MTOs), this represent more than 1.2 billion subscribers – the equivalent of one in seven of the world’s population – and 200,000 cash agents respectively.
HomeSend also said it is in the process of connecting its worldwide community of telecom partners and MTOs to the more than 24,000 financial institutions on the MasterCard network to provide consumers with more options and flexibility for sending or receiving funds and enable cross border remittance payments worldwide.
