Ethio telecom applies for a license to the National Bank of Ethiopia to start giving loans and saving services through telebirr as part of expanding its digital financial service.
“We are working to strength the digital economy in order to enable citizens to have an easy system whilst promoting financial inclusion,” said Firehiwot Tamiru, CEO of Ethio telecom. The CEO indicated that Ethio telecom is waiting the permit which is said to be issue soon.
To ensure the existence of various online payment options, on Wednesday April 20, 2022, the telecommunications firm signed an agreement with Ethiopian airlines on domestic flights ticket online purchasing system through telebirr.
“E-money service is playing a pivotal role in fostering the digital economy that the nation aspires to achieve along with improving our community’s digital payment system experience and in modernizing the existing customary cash transactions of institutions’ payment systems,” expressed Firehiwot.
Chief Commercial Officer of Ethiopian Airlines, Lemma Yadecha, who signed the agreement on behalf of the airline, said that the airline had challenges making transactions of over 30,000 birr round trip. He said now it has become possible to make direct sales for the stated amount.
The payment system integration agreement signed between the two government enterprises and the major revenue earners for the Ethiopian government would enable the Ethiopian Airlines’ passengers to have access to flight ticket online purchasing service at any time and everywhere using telebirr.
With few days left to mark its one year anniversary, following its launch in May 2021, telebirr has been able to garner a customer base of 17.6 million.
Through the year over 12.58-billion-birr local money transfer or transaction has been undertaken; while over half a million USD (528.4 thousand dollars) financial transfer has been made via telebirr from 34 countries in cooperation with eight international telebirr remittance partners with in only 5 months.
Telebirr now has 353 shops and through 80 master agents, 64,000 agents and over 16 thousand merchants service rendering partners and is also integrated with 12 commercial banks to render financial transfer service via the platform.
So far, over 52 institutions including traffic penalty payments, have integrated their services with telebirr to operate their businesses online, collect monthly bills and provide a number of online services to their customers. Furthermore, Ethio Telecom has already made the necessary preparations to integrate telebirr payment system with more than 20 governmental and non-governmental organizations and will soon officially launch the service accordingly.
“Enabling various business transaction payments ranging from making payments for small transaction to transferring large amount of money via telebirr, has significantly contributed to the adoption of digital payment system,” remarked the firm’s CEO in recent settings.
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