Mastercard has announced its partnership with South Africa-based FinTech company Yoco, to roll out some 15,000 mobile Point of Sale (mPOS) devices to SMEs across the country. The duo targets to spread mPOS to all SMEs in South Africa by the end of this year. While rolling out mPOS devices in South Africa, Mastercard and Yoco will also educate SMEs on the benefits of cashless transactions.
For SMEs to start accepting the mPOS cashless payments, all they need to do is connect a Yoco card reader to their Android or iOS devices. By doing so, the hardware will be paired with a comprehensive Point of Sale (POS) app and a business intelligence portal that will give the businesses real-time access to sales insights and analytics.
“Small and medium businesses employ over 60% of the labor force in South Africa, yet they lack the basic tools necessary to accept electronic payments and run their businesses effectively. Through this partnership, we will empower even more small businesses that previously did not accept card payments, while growing the market and making a contribution to our economy,” said Katlego Maphai, the Yoco CEO.
Mastercard reiterates that SMEs who have never accepted card payments before are turning to mPOS as the cashless-payment platform of choice.
“While the number of South Africans with access to formal banking products has grown substantially over the last few years, the number of card acceptance locations; especially at small businesses, has not grown in parallel. Solutions like Yoco enable these small and medium businesses to respond to their customers’ increasing desire to pay for good and services with payment cars rather than cash, which is higher risk, without making large upfront investments in infrastructure or facing high transaction costs,” said Mark Elliott, the Division President for Mastercard, Southern Africa.