The latest CA sector statistics report highlight that the total number of phones connected to mobile networks stood at 68.1 million during the period July – September 2024, translating to 131.5% of the Kenyan population using a mobile phone. Mobile money subscriptions in the country grew from 39.8 million to 40.6 million in the same period, meaning that 78.9% of the Kenyan population had access to mobile money services.
Despite the difference between mobile money subscriptions and mobile phone ownership highlighted by the CA report, averagely, every Kenyan makes at least one mobile money transaction in a day. Kenya is a pioneer in the mobile money industry and remains highly reputable as a country aggressively bridging the financial inclusion gap. A recent report from the CBK indicates that Kenyans deal an average of sh21.7 billion in phone transactions daily. The 68.1 million Kenyans who currently have access to a phone can today gain access to any mobile money services, alleviating the challenges associated with unbanked and underbanked populations.
Convergence of mobile communications and mobile money services
Telcos, fintech companies, mobile lenders and technology companies have played a crucial role in ensuring the access to mobile money services and the customer journeys on phones is seamless. This is attested to by the different access options to mobile money services such as the SIM Toolkit, USSD and the now widespread selfcare apps.
With many Kenyans carrying out a minimum of 1 transaction per day, a typical day for an urban-banked Kenyan would entail moving money from their bank to their mobile wallet. Once the money is in their wallet, they will make transactions across various payment ecosystems ranging from payments through paybills & till numbers, making transport payments in a matatu, fuelling, sending money to friends and family or even paying for shopping. These use cases are what majorly define an ordinary Kenyan’s life. Over and above this, the mobile phone will also be used to stay connected through internet, voice calls and SMS.
Driven by this insight, Airtel Kenya recently launched its Smarta Bundles, an innovative product that redefines the convergence of mobile communications and mobile money services. Airtel understands and appreciates the essence and need for convergence of these two spheres under one product package – Smarta Bundle – offering convenience and flexibility. Through these packages, Smarta Bundles customers exclusively get to enjoy 100% reimbursement of transaction costs as airtime on all their transactions, be it making payments to any paybill numbers, transferring money from their bank to Airtel Money wallets or while withdrawing money at any Airtel Money agents. Additionally, sending money from Airtel to Airtel remains free, whilst sending money across other networks is charged at considerably lower charges; payments to any buy goods till numbers does not attract any transaction charges.
Impressively, on the other hand, for KES 1000 per month, Smarta Bundles customers get 30 GB data, broken down into 1GB per day, they will be able to make free Airtel to Airtel calls across the month, get 400 call minutes to other networks and 2000 SMS to all networks. The most interesting thing about the data bundles is that any unused resources during a particular day rolls over to the following day, compounding until the end of the 30-day validity period. On renewing the package before or within 24 hours of expiration, the accumulated resources will be carried over to the new package.
With this product offering, Airtel continues to demonstrate that it has mastered the art of listening to its customers, providing them with options driven at resolving their communications needs. Smarta Bundles highlights the evolving telecommunications space that is primarily aimed at providing customers with convenience, flexibility, value-driven products and at the same time bridging the digital and financial inclusion gaps in the country.
With the different cashback benefits offered by the Smarta Bundles package, one might as well end up not spending any money on airtime as their Airtel Money transactions could essentially guarantee them the next month’s subscription to voice, data and SMS needs.
To subscribe to the Smarta Bundles, dial *544# or*334# on your Airtel SIM. Alternatively, you can subscribe through the My Airtel App or Airtel Lite.
