Denis Opudo
Paystack has collaborated with Truecaller to allow more African merchants to accept online payments. The payments will be made easily and securely. These will be possible by making use of SDK a mobile identity product of Truecaller. The deal will also offer a powerful resource. The resources will be used by startups and businesses across Africa to check on the mobile identity of their clients. It will then help to create more trust in the online payments scene in Africa.
Paystack is among the largest payment startups in Nigeria. It transacts around 20% of all online payments in the continent’s largest economy. It was also the first startup in Nigeria to join the renowned Y Combinator Accelerator. The startup aims at allowing African merchants accept payments from anyone at any place across the globe. Initially, all merchants that required to accept Paystack payments had to register with regulatory organizations. This prevented many legitimate offline businesses from testing the benefits of online payments. This is because many businesses in Nigeria are not registered.
The partnership allows merchants to verify their mobile identity through Truecaller. The integration of mobile number identity product by Truecaller as a mechanism of verification strengthens the merchant verification process of the Paystack’s site. It also makes it possible to open Paystack to the significant number of unregistered businesses. These are businesses that were not able to accept Paystack’s online payments. According to the CEO of Paystack Shola Akinlade, the partnership gives Paystack a chance to deliver on their promise of frictionless experience and trust. He added that the platform is aiming to ensure that all businesses paid using Paystack are seriously checked for credibility and legitimacy. According to Shola Paystack needed to have a balance between the strong desire of opening a Paystack up to unregistered businesses and the need to protect customers’ interest. He added that customers need to be assured by the firm that each Paystack merchant they pay is a verified business. Therefore the partnership ensures that Paystack continues to be critical to the trust of the customers.
Additionally, Paystack will introduce Truecaller as an option of verification. This is for local startups and developers who want to verify their own client’s identity using the development platform of Paystack. Paystack already has three verification options in place for developers. The three are the ability to verify card details. The ability to verify bank account details, and the ability to verify the customers’ Bank Verification Number (BVN). BVN is an identification number given by regulators in Nigeria. Truecaller will come in as the fourth new option of verification, and it will develop more trust in the African businesses payments flow. A micro-lending application will typically use it. The partnership between Truecaller and Paystack gives the lending app developers a chance to verify the real identity of borrowers using their mobile identity that is using their phone numbers.
More than 50 million Africans use Truecaller. Users in Nigeria have blocked more than 13 million calls and 25 million spam SMS each month using the app. In November 2017 the app announced plans to increase partnership with the African businesses, developers, and startups ecosystem. Its partnership with Paystack indicates a definite step towards helping businesses maximize on the power of mobile identity platform of Truecaller. Priyam Bose, the head of global development and startup relations at Truecaller talked of the importance of the partnership. He said that their partner is enabling the growth of online payment ecosystem and digitization of businesses for the economy in Nigeria.
