Paycentre

Paycentre is a solution that is geared towards creating access to payment and financial services especially in the underserved areas. Our easy to use platform grants you total control and insight into your business performance. Paycentre is an agency banking solution that allow users perform banking hall services such as; funds transfer, cash out, loan application, bill payment, cash deposit and airtime top up through the use of our mPOS device. 

The Paycentre solution is targeted at reaching all those that are financial excluded. we are creating jobs for the underserved population by leveraging on our solution to improve access to payment and financial services. 

Currently a lot of communities in Nigeria have limited access to financial services which leaves us with a gap in access financial services.

Paycentre aims to tackle the issues of having people of certain class being financial excluded and to promote cashless policy in our society. As at 2020, the periodic measurement of the financial inclusion rate puts Nigeria's performance at 63.2%, leaving us with a 16.8% gap in projected achievement.

We hope to increase this rate by expanding our reach across Africa. The more people have access to financial services the higher the chances of getting more financially included. 

Paycentre is a solution that allows agents carry out banking hall services remotely there by bringing access to payment and financial services closer to the people especially those in the underserved areas. Our easy to use mPOS solution works with an andriod phone for internet connectivity and visuals. 

Agents log in on the app through their android phone and connect to the device, choose transaction type then proceed to insert debit card on the device for completion. We also carry out card-less transactions which allows users without card carry out financial transactions. 

Our solution uses the EMV technology and Bluetooth. The EMV technology enables the Pinpad to read debit and credit cards while the bluetooth technology is used for interaction between the Pinpad and the app. 

Paycentre solution serves every adult that is affected by the gap in access to financial services. However, our target audience remains those that are in the underserved(those who don't have bank branches within their locality) areas. Nigeria commercial bank branches was at level of 4.3 number per 100,000 adults as at 2018. 

We engage our agents from time to time through surveys and the small committee that serves as upline for agents in certain region to confirm that we are meeting their pain points. 

Paycentre is a reliable agency banking solution that allows agents to get instant settlement on transactions processed with competitive pricing.

The Paycentre solution continues to serve as the first hand financial service provider to the all that is affected by the gap in access to financial services.

Our solution, problem and our target population are aligned with the goals of the Challenge. Our solution covers the aspect of reliable financial tools to allow people and small businesses to thrive in the digital economy. Our target demography is the middle and low income earners who do not have access to first hand financial services. 

Paycentre creates jobs for our agents while solving the problem of the above mentioned class of people as regards access to payment and financial services. 

Currently, we have over 60,000 agent network across Nigeria processing almost 300,000 transactions in volume and $5m in value daily.

Our instant settlement and swift transaction dispute resolution process gives us the edge and helps us expand our reach through the trust that we have built with our agents over time.

Our business model/ revenue line are annual app maintenance charges, transaction charges and third party transaction charges.

Our solution serves as mediator between the customer and the bank. Our customer satisfaction is first on our priority list, this makes it possible for us to continually come up with innovative ideas and features around customer retention.

Our instant settlement on transactions enable agents to perform more transactions as funds wont be a problem to them.  We have realized that most customers who patronize our agents are sometimes in dire need of the funds and to help solve this problem, we started the 24hrs dispute resolution process as opposed the 3-7 working days industry dispute deadline which makes business easier for both agents and customers. 

The Paycentre solution currently has over 60,000 agents located in all 36 states in Nigeria with which we service over 300,000 persons daily according to our transaction volume. Through our agent network, we have over 1million unique users. 

However, there are more areas we are yet to cover, which is leaving us at a target of 100,000 agent network by 2021 ending which will proportionately increase the number of people that will be directly affected by our solution. 

Our five year plan is to get at least 10million unique users through the expansion of our agent network. 

We have increasing number of our agents spread across all regions in Nigeria, with over 80% of them actively performing transactions through the Paycentre solution. 

We have high number of women amongst our agent demography which addresses the issue of gender and financial literacy for women. 

We have slightly over 100 individuals working on the Paycentre solution as full time staff.

Our management team has served at different levels with different responsibilities with a combined experience of over 25 years in the financial industry.

In addition to technical know-how, we also leverage focus groups, and customer advisory councils where a selected pool of customers are consistently engaged and included in innovations, addition of features to existing solutions etc.

We also leverage on ambassadors who serve as representatives or foot soldiers of the brand in local communities. Their real-time feedback also influences what we do inhouse

At E-settlement limited, we place a high value on inclusion. we believe that regardless of conventional barriers faced in the work place- gender, race, age, hierarchy etc- each and every employee matters and their opinions count. Therefore, we encourage employees to take initiative, to take risks, to make mistakes. One of our core values is UBUNTU (I am because you are) which is a concept that promotes teamwork, togetherness, trust and accountability. 

We are applying to Solve challenge to enable us expand our reach at bridging the gap in access to financial services to the people in the underserved community across Africa.

By so doing we will be improving the economy and helping to reduce unemployment rate. 

Financial: securing investment opportunities

Public Relations: global brand awareness 

Product / Service Distribution: service distribution through relevant partnership

The organizations we will like to partner with are; 

World Bank: to enable outreaches and leveraging on data discover more underserved communities for viable businesses. 

IMF: to secure funding for further expansion. 

Paycentre solution is positioned towards bridging gender gap by focusing on access to financial services and financial literacy for women. Overtime, we have had women use our solution and gain financial independence thereby reducing unemployment rate among women.