Sassa mulls move into mobile technology
Paying grants using mobile money tech could reduce costs and mean beneficiaries don’t have to travel to receive payments
The SA Social Security Agency (Sassa) is toying with the use of mobile money technology to distribute grants. Mobile money largely fizzled in SA in 2016, when Vodacom and MTN pulled the plug on their offerings. Though they were doing well in other markets, they struggled to gain traction at home because of SA’s high rate of banking inclusion relative to the rest of the continent. But as Sassa searches for new ways in which to pay social grants when Net1’s Cash Paymaster Services finally hands over the reins in September, it’s possible that mobile money could make a comeback. The technology "is under consideration for future use, and consultations are under way", Sassa spokesperson Kgomoco Diseko tells the FM. The social security agency is trying to reduce the number of beneficiaries who receive their grants in cash, and has already made some headway on that front. Of the 17m South Africans who depend on grants, about 1.9m received their payments in cash at Sassa paypoints this month...
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