Mobile Money interoperability in Kenya has officially gone live starting with Airtel Money and M-Pesa with other players such as Telkom with T-Kash said to join soon. For anyone who cares to look, you will realize that one side is excited by the whole affair while the other seems not to care that much.
Unfortunately, as seamless as mobile money interoperability will be, the process to actually send these funds is not as straightforward as we’d have wished. The service is accessible via USSD and it’s not embedded within the SIM ToolKit thus sending money from M-Pesa to Airtel Money will require you to remember some certain codes and it’s not as easy as just accessing the mobile money menu on your SIM Toolkit.
To send money from Airtel Money to M-Pesa:
- Dial *222*1#
- Select Language
- Select option 1 – Send money
- Select option 2 – Send money to Mpesa
- Enter recipient’s number
- Enter PIN when prompted
To send money from M-Pesa to Airtel Money:
- Dial *234#
- Select option 1 – Mpesa products
- Select 98 – More Services
- Select option 8 – Tuma Pesa popote
- Enter recipients number
- Enter PIN when prompted
Once you are done memorizing that process, here are the transaction charges that you will incur:
Airtel Money to M-Pesa Transaction Charges
| Minimum Amount (Kes.) | Maximum Amount (Kes.) | Transaction Charges (Kes.) |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | 100 | 0 |
| 101 | 500 | 7 |
| 501 | 1,000 | 9 |
| 1,001 | 1,500 | 15 |
| 1,501 | 2,500 | 24 |
| 2,501 | 3,500 | 33 |
| 3,501 | 5,000 | 36 |
| 5,001 | 7,500 | 45 |
| 7,501 | 10,000 | 51 |
| 10,001 | 15,000 | 57 |
| 15,001 | 20,000 | 60 |
| 20,001 | 70,000 | 66 |
M-Pesa to Airtel Money Transaction Charges
| Minimum Amount (Kes.) | Maximum Amount (Kes.) | Transaction Charges (Kes.) |
|---|---|---|
| 101 | 500 | 11 |
| 501 | 1,000 | 15 |
| 1,001 | 1,500 | 26 |
| 1,501 | 2,500 | 41 |
| 2,501 | 3,500 | 56 |
| 3,501 | 5,000 | 61 |
| 5,001 | 7,500 | 77 |
| 7,501 | 10,000 | 87 |
| 10,001 | 15,000 | 97 |
| 15,001 | 20,000 | 102 |
| 20,001 | 70,000 | 105 |
Also, note that Airtel Money users can only withdraw from Airtel Money agents and not M-Pesa agents and this rule applies to M-Pesa users as well.
