Safaricom has been selected among a group of lenders and IT firms that have been licensed to offer cashless payments in Public Service Vehicles (PSVs) in Kenya.
This will eventually set the stage for the ban of use of cash in public transport.
In a notice, National Safety and Transport Authority (NTSA) said the licensed 29 companies will offer a platform for cashless fare payment service.
This was in response to a June 16, 2020 tender where NTSA sought tech companies to install mobile software and web applications for the nearly 2 00,000 matatus in the country.
The digital fare collection system will also have the technical capability to contact trace passengers in the fight against the coronavirus.
Once the system is in place, all passengers will be required to pay their fares via mobile money platforms, giving the government access to their identities and personal contact information that is needed to combat the Covid-19 pandemic, which has disrupted lives worldwide.
Alongside Safaricom, other top firms permitted to offer the cashless fare system are Craft Silicon (behind taxi-hailing App-Little), JamboPay, Cellullant (a pan-African payments gateway firm), KCB Bank Kenya, and CBA Bank now NCBA.
