Safaricom’s M-Pesa Goes Global: You can now Send and Receive Money Across the World

M-Pesa customers can now send and receive money from anywhere across the world following a newly launched service by Safaricom dubbed ‘M-Pesa Global’.

In a first of its kind, all M-PESA customers can now send money to almost any individual across the world through a variety of channels including directly into their bank accounts, and for pick up at more than 500,000 Western Union agent locations.

Safaricom’s Chief Financial Services Officer Sitoyo Lopokoiyit stated that the new service is set to bring the convenience, safety, and speed of M-PESA to the rest of the world and will enable Kenyans to send and receive money across the world from the comfort of their mobile phones.

“M-PESA Global seeks to connect Kenyans to opportunities by making it easy and seamless for them to transact with the world and for the world to transact with Kenyans,” added Sitoyo Lopokoiyit.

Customers can access the new service by dialing *840# or by selecting “M-PESA Global” under the M-PESA menu on mySafaricomApp.

In addition to already existing channels, M-PESA Global will immediately enable customers to send money for pick up at more than 500,000 Western Union agent locations across the world. Transfers through bank accounts to the United Arab Emirates, the United Kingdom, and Germany will also be available immediately, with services to bank accounts in other countries being rolled out in the coming weeks. 

With M-PESA Global, Kenya achieves another first in enabling sending and receiving of money between mobile phones and virtually any individual across the world.

M-PESA Global already allows customers to make and receive payments from more than 200 million PayPal customers from 200 markets across the world.

Other partners available on the platform include World Remit and HomeSend among others.