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Ghana is getting lucky again with another cash-lite system that will help boost its cashless economy and reduce reliance on cash in the country. Absa Bank Ghana, in partnership with global payments company Visa, has launched Absa Pay.
The Absa Pay is a new tap-to-pay solution that turns customers' smartphones into contactless payment tools, allowing them to make payments directly from their smartphones.
The service enables users to simply tap their NFC-enabled phones on payment terminals to complete transactions. This helps to remove the need for physical cards or cash. It makes everyday payments faster, seamless and more comfortable.
In addition to that, the rollout highlights a renewed effort to speed up Ghana’s move toward a cash-lite economy by bringing digital payment options into everyday shopping and transactions.
Notably, this new payment system is fully built and integrated directly into the existing Absa App. This means, existing Absa customers can access and use the tap-to-pay feature directly in the Absa Mobile banking app without a separate wallet or app.
How Absa Pay works in Ghana
Absa bank partners Visa to integrate the tap-to-pay feature into the bank's mobile app. The feature uses Near Field Communication (NFC), the same wireless tech you see in Apple Pay, Google Pay, and card tap functions globally, to process payments instantly when a smartphone is tapped on an NFC-enabled point-of-sale terminal.
Once the Absa Pay is activated inside your existing Absa banking app, simply tap your phone on any NFC-enabled point-of-sale terminal at shops, fuel stations, or restaurants to make payments. You don’t need a physical debit card, not even a Visa card.
Visa and Absa both highlight that this technology can help bring more people into the formal financial system in Ghana. Fabrice Konan of Visa Ghana) stressed the goal of the partnership is to make payments “effortless” and extend fast, secure, and reliable ways to pay for more people in Ghana.
However, what you need to use the Asba Bank's Tap-to-Pay are: smartphone that has NFC support, the latest Absa mobile banking app, active mobile banking account with Absa, and enable NFC and Absa Pay in the app before tapping to pay. Once set up properly, you'll be able to pay at most NFC-enabled POS terminals wherever Visa contactless payments are accepted in Ghana.
How it compares with other payment methods
It's very important to note that Absa Pay is different from Ghana’s mobile money and QR systems. Absa Pay focuses specifically on tap-to-pay using NFC, which is generally faster and more seamless for in-store purchases compared to QR scans or traditional money transfers like MoMo.
Furthermore, Absa Pay is built directly into Absa’s mobile banking app and has local approval, making it a more practical option for Absa customers at the moment. On a contrary, services like Google Pay and Apple Pay are still not usable in Ghana because many local banks are yet to integrate with them.
