VaultsPay, Wibmo to launch pre-paid card for GCC’s underbanked segment

VaultsPay, a Dubai-based fintech, and Wibmo, a PayU company that works with around 275 banks and fintechs globally, including about 30 in the Middle East and 70 across MENA, have joined hands to launch an innovative pre-paid card platform that aims to accelerate financial inclusion in the Middle East.

Aimed at serving the large population of underbanked people in region, the prepaid card will be launched across the GCC with a phase-wide approach and go live in the third quarter of the year.

According to the Arab Monetary Fund, 79 per cent of the MENA region’s young adults are unbanked, there is a gap of over 23 per cent between women and men in accessing financial services, and 72 per cent of the poorest citizens can benefit from financial inclusion.

While countries such as the UAE have introduced the wage payment scheme, there is still potential to channel the unskilled and semi-skilled workers – estimated at over 2.2 million – about 52 per cent of the workforce, as per a UNSDG report, for online transactions through innovative fintech solutions.

Through the partnership, VaultsPay will leverage Wibmo’s pre-paid platform to build cutting-edge card issuance capabilities that is also feature-rich, configurable to specific requirements and secure. The platform’s SaaS modules are simple to integrate, significantly reducing the time to market.

Operating as a closed loop platform, with use on the VaultsPay platform, the new pre-paid card will specifically help meet the ease of financial transactions of blue collar workers, who may not have bank accounts, and have less resources for online transactions. It will also add to the convenience and cost-effective human resource management of corporates. They can make wage payment and other services for their employees by depositing salaries into pre-paid accounts. These cards can then be used by the employees to withdraw money, as well as at various shops and merchant places.

Dr. Mohammed Afifi, CEO of VaultsPay, said: “As a fast-growing fintech with a global footprint, we see a tremendous opportunity to drive financial inclusion in the MENA region, serving from the UAE, a hub for innovative fintech services. With millions of people who serve on unskilled jobs, their participation in seamless financial transactions and online engagement is limited. As the region pivots to digitalisation and the move towards cashless transactions, our solution aims to drive economic inclusion for a large pool of unbanked and underbanked people. Together with Wibmo, our goal is to implement a transformational payment solution that is safe, secure, reliable and easy to use, and makes a real and meaningful impact.”

Chitrajit Chakrabarti, head of Middle East and Africa – Wibmo, said: “Our partnership with VaultsPay marks an important milestone for us as we grow our presence in the Middle East region, and even more importantly, deliver an impactful solution that is aligned with the UNSDGs and the vision of regional governments to drive digital transformation. We’ve always focused on innovative, cutting-edge payment solutions that will help our clients address some of the key challenges intrinsic to their business. Alongside VaultsPay, we will build a complete issuance ecosystem that will drive multi-institutional transaction processing and corporate payments serving both workers and corporates.”

Bringing exceptional benefits such as quick implementation within eight to 12 weeks, zero dependency with own switch, hosted services and on-premises/cloud deployment, tokenisation enabled, being omnichannel configurable, and assuring customisable reporting. With no one-size-fits-all solution for pre-cards, the solution will be available in a variety of programme models, each with unique capabilities.