Absa Partners with Stitch and Ozow to Launch Absa Pay for Enterprise Merchants in South Africa

Absa, one of South Africa’s big-four banks, has partnered with local payments start-ups Stitch and Ozow to launch Absa Pay for enterprise merchants across South Africa.

Under the partnership with Stitch, the fintech firm will offer direct bank application programming interfaces (APIs), including Absa Pay, Capitec Pay and Nedbank Direct API, as part of its broader “pay by bank” solution.

With this addition, the payments start-up says Absa clients will be able to make payments directly from their Absa account to any Stitch merchant that integrates Absa Pay. According to Stitch, “pay by bank” is the fastest-growing payment method in SA, with rising demand from consumers due to its “seamless experience, speed and security”.

It notes Absa is the latest major bank in SA to release a direct API, allowing clients to make bank payments directly from their Absa account to that of online merchants they wish to pay, without the need to enter their banking details online.

“We are excited to introduce this payment solution to approximately three million digitally-active customers,” says Subash Sharma, chief digital officer at Absa Everyday Banking.

“We are incredibly proud to collaborate with leading payment fintech companies, using open banking technology to create a seamless and safe online banking experience. These collaborations are important to maintain a fully-secure ecosystem for our customers and partners. But we advise customers to maintain vigilance and safeguard their digital banking ‘keys to the safe’ – a PIN and password should not be shared with third-party sites,” Sharma adds.

By integrating Ozow’s platform with Absa Pay, both companies say they aim to improve the digital payments ecosystem. They say this alliance is facilitated through South Africa’s proprietary open banking-payments interface, reflecting a significant shift in how South Africans interact with their banks and conduct transactions.

Credit: itweb