First Capital ropes in Western Union
First Capital Bank has added Western Union to its list of partnership arrangements with money transfer agents.
Zimbabwe Stock Exchange (ZSE), listed financial services provider, First Capital Bank Limited, says it will continue to enhance and reshape its service delivery for key market segments.
This comes after the financial services group introduced a new collaborative partnership with Western Union to add to the two it already had arrangements with.
First Capital has been on a drive to have a slice of the remittance industry as it keeps on adding more services. Previously they only offered RIA but they have since added Hello Paisa earlier in the year.
The bank said in a statement “We bring you Western Union in addition to RIA and Hello Paisa MTA collection services. Next time you receive US dollars from outside Zim, come to First Capital Bank.”
This comes as Diaspora remittances into Zimbabwe for the six months to June 2022 grew to US$797 million, a 23 percent increase from US$651 million recorded over the same period last year, according latest Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe (RBZ) statistics.
Remittances into Zimbabwe have been incrementally growing for the past three years.
“Total foreign currency receipts increased by 33,6 percent in the first half of 2022, while Diaspora remittances rose by 23 percent,” said Dr Nebson Mupunga, deputy director for Economic Policy and Research Division at the RBZ. Statistics from the RBZ also show that diaspora remittances surged from about US$$1 billion in 2020 to US$1,4 billion in 2021 as the country hit record high foreign currency
inflows of US$9.7 billion during that period.
Finance and Economic Development Minister Professor Mthuli Ncube recently said remittances had overtaken foreign aid.
So, it would only make sense that more banks get as many money transfer agents (MTAs) on as possible.
Western Union Money Transfer Agency is a reputable and internationally recognised organisation that has set the pace of the remittance market with major operations around the world.
The remittance services of Western Union has been in business for over 170 years and is headquartered in Denver, Colorado in the United States with 600,000 agent locations worldwide in more than 200 countries.
Under this partnership, First Capital will offer “Cash Pay Out” services to walk-in customers across its branch network with a valid Western Union token code after all the necessary checks have been performed.-The Herald
