South Africa-based financial services platform Mukuru has launched a drive-thru service in Chisipite, Harare in Zimbabwe for domestic and international money transfers. The firm aims to enhance its promise of making financial services more accessible to people across Zimbabwe.
The drive-thru is one of the fintech’s newest locations in Zimbabwe, joining nine other sites which launched in February 2023. According to the World Bank, remittances to Sub-Saharan Africa grew an estimated 5.2 per cent to $53billion in 2022, compared with 16.4 per cent the previous year. The slowdown in the growth rate of remittance flows into the region is attributed to persistent “adverse conditions in the global environment and regional source countries.”
Despite a slowdown in the growth rate, the fintech is pushing forward with its aims to improve financial inclusion at this time. Marc Carrie-Wilson, country manager for Zimbabwe at Mukuru, explained: “Whilst we are realistic about the economic outlook, as a leading Southern African financial services business, we strive to enable financial inclusion for Africa’s emerging market. This is why we continuously shift our focus to innovative ways that make financial services more accessible for the people of Zimbabwe and those in the diaspora.
“As we increase our footprint in the country, we explored various innovative ideas to push the envelope and challenge the type of locations that we have as a financial services company. Safety remains a top priority for us, and the drive-thru idea proved to be the safest and most convenient option for our customers.
“The Chisipite drive-thru is open from 7am to 7pm daily (including public holidays) and comes with a ‘walk-in’ option for customers who wish to register or visit the location on foot. Out of the ten new locations, Chisipite is the only drive-thru at the moment, but we hope to launch one in Bulawayo in the next phase.”
Partnerships
As part of its innovation, Mukuru has also launched a series of services in the past few months to build a diverse product offering for customers. This includes a partnership with Multichoice which is aiming to make paying for DStv more convenient. Mukuru also formed a partnership with Bereka to deliver money transfers directly to customers across Zimbabwe.
Carrie-Wilson concluded: “We have seen how well these collaborations work in our ongoing partnership with wholesaler Metro Peech & Browne, who make purchasing groceries, stationery and appliances more convenient for people in Zimbabwe who use our platform.”
Mukuru currently boasts over 100 million transactions to date. The fintech built its core to provide international money transfers and from this base also developed a set of services to address the broader financial needs of its customers. Mukuru now operates in over 50 countries, as well as across over 300 remittance corridors.
