Did You Know That Paypal Works in Kenya?

By
Titus Githiru
-
12

East Africa Particularly Kenya is appreciating the potentials of E commerce more than most countries in Africa.After the fibre optic landed in Kenya, more and more opportunities keep on emerging and  giant companies such us Google have shown interest in the Kenyan Market.Now,a giant  online payment system,Paypal has finally enrolled Kenya in the list of supported countries.This is a dream come true for a Kenyan who wanted to transact online but was cut back because Kenya wasn’t supported.What does the entry of paypal means to the local market?

  • Having being in business for quite a while,people will have confidence on it and they would rather choose it over other unpopular gateways.
  • Websites are able to incorporate paypal as a payment option in their websites,this is ussually important to companies whose clients are abroad e.g travel websites and many others.

Paypal might not have given us the whole cake but the piece we have is a move in the right direction and promises a brighter future ahead.The ony limitation currently is that you cannot withdraw the funds to a local bank account from your account but roumour has it that they might be collaborating with equity bank se we will have to stand and wait.Meanwhile we have a reason to take E-commerce to the next level with this revolutionary service


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Titus Githiru
Titus is interested in personal tech that takes the form of utility, how tech disrupts our day to day life and the ways it makes life easier.

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12 COMMENTS

  1. So how exactly does it work i.e the practicalities? Run me through them coz the impression I have is that you still have to have an account in the US or a Payoneer card…

    • Hallo Susan, currently you can get an account at paypal with your Equity bank DEBIT card, which you will then proceed with loading credit to use for your purchase. What is not working yet is recieving payments.

      • Hey Joe,
        It’s great to know that this can actually work. I think what you can do to help the rest of us here is tell us how this can be done, just write it here. The experience I have is that if you tell people to communicate to you privately in matters to do with money then they get to suspect you. Even if you are looking at making some money out of helping guys get to withdraw through paypal, you can basically share the information frankly then let people contact you at individual levels, direct them to your website or something, write an article about it or something…and in the end you will still promote your businesses by helping the rest with information that empowers them. So you will gain by offering the technical solution because after we have the information maybe not all of us are technically empowered to implement it. Cheers!
        Hi,
        If you have some issues with withdrawing from paypal money in Kenya, I can help you with it. Just ping me at [email protected] I do some online business and i always receive payments through paypal.

  3. For me I still dont get the part that paypal is finally working in Kenya. What I get is that paypal is undertaking some arrangements with Equity bank to possibly make it work in Kenya(at least according to the rumours) but we dont know when. If it is a matter of using paypal to purchase something online, this was never the issue actually. The issue has always been receiving money right here in Kenya through paypal and until this works I doubt if we can really speak of paypal working in Kenya. Afterall all one needs to make a purchase online is simply an enabled card, for example a debit card-regardless of the bank. By the way there are other means that you can explore to receive money in Kenya as we wait for paypal to function when they wish. You can try services like Alertpay and moneybookers, I’m told they work. Cheers!

    • Great insight John on this interesting article. It is true that the problem we face in Kenya is receiving money from outside the country through paypal. I have just recently created an account with Moneybookers and will let you know soon if it can receive money from outside the country. There are also other payment system in which needs to be looked up to see whether they can receive money such as 2checkout, Worldpay, Google CheckOut, Any Pay, Authorize Net, CCNow, Charge.com, Digital River, Fire Pay, Internet Cash, MerchantEquip, PayQuake, Pro Pay

      • That’s great Enock, thank you for sharing the options, this is what we need. Lets know if moneybookers worked for you and maybe the logistics involved. And I was wondering, how about the local payments for local transactions for example if someone wants to buy something online in Kenya. Are the local telcos like safcom, Airtel..making it possible in the simplest meaning of it? Techweez..a research and maybe an elaborate article in this line?

  5. well i also want to know, somebody used the KCB prepay credit card? I understand it allows you to shop online without the necessary credit history required for a normal credit card

  6. StretchGO http://stretchGO is working with paypal to make accept withdrawals to Kenya through Equity Bank. I think this will work because it is like StretchGO makes money through paypal.

    I must that it is nice that technology has landed in Kenya and smart people are now born in Kenya to make solutions a mile away.

    I emailed the StretchGO people yesterday and they told that in two to three weeks it will work.

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