Safaricom appears to be developing an M-PESA app following the publication of a similarly named app in Google Play Store.
The app, which has been downloaded more than 10K times, is anything but what you already seen in the current mySafaricom app.
Besides the normal ordinary Safaricom functions that we have become accustomed to in the existing, nearly fully-fledged utility app by the operator, which is also equipped with other lifestyle services such as access to newspapers, to mention a few, the new app is entirely M-PESA-based and does not seem to add any other service on top.
Bear in mind that product is still under development, so there is a likelihood that we will see additional feature integration before the carrier fully releases it to the masses.
We have also come to notice that Safaricom usually starts the development of a new app, puts it out there for people to test, and once it goes official, the company phases out the older application.
Whether this will be the case is something we have no idea about, and there is a 50-50 chance it will take over the current mySafaricom app – or the telco will just let it stand by itself.
We have two reasons for this split decision: first, and as we have seen, the M-PESA app is simply that, and does not appear to carry other features that exist in mySafaricom. This would imply that it is new product overall. Also, the naming tells it all too.
Secondly is that the presentation of the M-PESA application is modern, and is visually attractive, to say the least. The cosmetic overhaul is probably something the operator has been exploring and going by past history, this will be the new face of a Safaricom utility tool.
It should be noted that these are projections, and things could change over time, so we will keep our fingers crossed.
[We have also noticed it lacks some services like M-Shwari and KCB M-PESA]
Lastly, you may have noticed that we haven’t talked about any of the under-development app’s features, probably because this is more of an observation than a deep-dive into a product that is still in the grey area in terms of its goals. Still, you can check it out (on Android), and examine it for a personal opinion.
