Prudential Bank To Partner With Ria Money Transfer In Ghana
Ria is the third largest provider of Money Transfer services worldwide, with more than 300,000 locations worldwide, whilst Prudential bank has a strong footprint in Ghana, so the deal makes sense.
The announcement was made last week and a launch ceremony held in Accra, Ghana’s capital.
Mary Brown, Deputy Managing Director for Prudential’s Banking operations, told the gathering that she was “extremely confident that Ria is the best choice for customers in transferring money.”
All 40 branches of Prudential in Ghana, which according to the World Bank received more than $2bn of personal remittances in 2014, will now include an in-store branch of Ria.
6 of Ria’s senior global management team attended the launch - a sign that the money transfer company is serious about cracking the Ghanaian market.
Ria, with its distinctive bright orange branding, is already in 37 African countries, across nearly 20,000 locations, including 1,300 locations in Ghana thanks to an extensive network of more than 20 retail partners in the country, but the company’s Managing Director for Africa, El Hadji Malick Seck, is targeting further expansion.
Seck was Quoted in AfricanCourier.de as saying:
“Ria is now serving tens of thousands of local communities and helping remittance flows to some of Africa’s most remote locations. We’re offering bank deposit and cash pick up options through most of our partners to reach the underbanked, but we’d still like to see more competition in the marketplace.”
“More competition means more choice, which means more customers can benefit from our fast, secure, and affordable service.”
Ria has partnerships in place with GCB Bank, Ghana’s largest domestic financial services company, announced in 2015, as well as Capital Bank, whose head of remittances, Adwoa Buadu commented earlier this year at a press conference:
“We have not only experienced world-class service from the Ria team, we have also experienced a money transfer service that is simple, reliable and secure.”
Seck added: “Ria is always working to expand its network by partnering with banks, financial institutions, and post offices,”
“Our overall goal is to bring affordable money transfer to everyone that needs it and we will keep working to spread Ria’s orange wave further, until it reaches all corners of Africa.”
The Money Cloud View
Africa is a key market for remittances, with around $50 billion flowing into the Middle East and North Africa each year, and around $33 billion into Sub Sharan Africa. The continent’s infrastructure when it comes to financial services is also unique, with a large “unbanked” population – who may come to rely on trends such as mobile banking and instant payments services.
In some ways it’s surprising that a more old-fashioned service provider like Ria Money Transfer is targeting growth in the region, when many of the more ‘disruptive’ money transfer services offer better rates and cheaper fees, but perhaps Ria are ready to roll out some of their own digital services to help save their customers money. If they don’t they risk being marginalised – disruptive solutions are putting the power back in the customer’s hands.
