South Africa has already built the technology to move money in seconds. The unresolved challenge is convincing banks to let customers use it without paying extra.
Interbank transfers have traditionally come with a fee, reflecting the cost of moving money between banks. PayShap, South Africa’s instant-payment rail, has been available to bank customers since 2023. Yet customers can still pay a fee at some banks for a transfer that takes seconds to complete, raising questions about whether instant payments should be priced as a premium service.
GoTyme Bank, South Africa’s digital-first challenger lender, is now challenging that model. The bank, formerly known as TymeBank, has offered free instant payments of up to R5,000 ($309) since launching PayShap for its customers in 2023. It is now calling on the wider banking industry to do the same.
“It’s not that the underlying payment infrastructure has no cost,” Marin Cundall, managing executive for digital experience at GoTyme Bank, told TechCabal on Friday. “Our position is that a modern, efficient bank can make a strategic choice not to pass every cost directly to the customer.”
Originally published by TechCabal.