M-Pesa users will now have the opportunity to ascertain the names of persons they are sending money to, saving them the agony of losing funds to wrong recipients.
Safaricom has introduced a new function called 'Hakikisha' in its M-Pesa menu, which gives its clients a fifteen-second time frame to confirm the name of the person they want to send the money to.
The name of the person expected to receive the money will be compared to that in the official customer register hence ensuring that money is no longer sent to wrong numbers.
The new feature 'Hakikisha' will be suspended if no transaction is completed after five consecutive trials by typing 1 to STOP the transaction.
The mobile service provider receives approximately 12,000 calls daily from M-Pesa customers, pleading for help after sending money to unintended recipients.
“While a majority of these are resolved successfully, we appreciate that this is a major inconvenience for our customers,” said Safaricom’s financial services director, Betty Mwangi.
"Hakikisha" was being tested by the telecommunication firm for the past month and will be unveiled in different phases by October 30.
M-Pesa which was previously being hosted in Germany for 8 years transferred its functionality to Kenya at the beginning of this year.
Safaricom said that they expected minimal service outages with M-Pesa being hosted locally.
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