NATIONAL MICROFINANCE BANK, MASTERCARD IN NEW TIE-UP

NMB Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Mark Wiessing (right) and MasterCard’s Division President, Sub-Saharan Africa, Daniel Monehin (left) as captured during the signing agreement in Dar es Salaam recently.

The National Microfinance Bank (NMB) has signed an agreement with MasterCard that will see the latter rolling out 1.5 million payment cards for the bank’s customers.

The move seeks to reduce dependency on cash in the making financial transactions as Tanzania goes towards cashless payments.

With the agreement, NMB will issue secure Europay, MasterCard and Visa (EMV) chip and pin MasterCard prepaid debit card over the next seven years.

EMV a global standard for inter-operation of integrated circuit cards that are used at point of sale (POS) terminals and automated teller machines (ATMs), for authenticating credit and debit card transactions.

“We will start issuing the cards to few clients in the next few weeks and thereafter we will roll out the cards starting the first quarter of next year,” NMB chief executive officer (CEO) Mark Wiessing said at the weekend.

He said security concerns were taken into consideration and that is why it took three years to reach the decision of announcing the partnership to roll out the technology.

“The cards will feature MasterCard’s contactless technology, and signals the largest roll out of contactless MasterCard payment cards in the country to date,” he expressed.

The MasterCard’s Division President, Sub-Saharan Africa, Daniel Monehin, said that through the partnership, the two have combined MasterCard’s global payment technology with the NMB network of 170 branches, over 70,000 e-money cashpoints and the largest ATM network in the country.

According to Mr Wiessing, the decision to partner with global players in financial services stems from the fact that the number of Tanzanians who have access to financial products is on the increase, hence an increase in the country’s middle class stratum.

In line with the new deal, NMB will also introduce the World Rewards card for its customers. The World Rewards is a premium MasterCard product that specifically targets the bank’s affluent customers.

With the World Reward cardholders will be able to earn loyalty point on their card spent, which can be redeemed for flights at over 800 airlines worldwide, car rentals and major car rental brands and hotel stay at over 160,000 hotels globally.

MORE INFO: ABOUT EMV

Named after its original developers (Europay, MasterCard and Visa), the EMV is smart chip technology EMV chip technology used globally for credit card and debit card payments.

Chip technology is an evolution in our payment system that helps increase security, reduce fraud and enable the use of future value-added applications. Chip cards are standard bank cards that are embedded with a micro computer chip. Some may require a PIN instead of a signature to complete the transaction process.

The Citizen