BancABC, a subsidiary of Pan African banking giant Atlas Mara has partnered with the Harare City Council and City Parking to introduce innovative payment solutions across all council platforms throughout the city. The partnership was officially launched on Thursday 17 October 2019 at the Town Hall by the Harare Mayor, Herbert Gomba and BancABC CEO, Dr Lance Mambondiani at an event attended by several dignitaries and Councillors.
The integrated payment solution is expected to complement City of Harare’s current drive encouraging residents to settle their rates bills in the council halls timeously and also increase convenience to motorists who have struggled to pay for parking services in the CBD due to shortages of electronic paying points.
The bank, which is currently going through an aggressive digital transformation process, has rolled out over 350 m-POS devices, which have been named, “The A-POS”, across Harare to help make city parking payments easier & more convenient.
The A-POS machines are light-weight & easy for parking attendants to carry in their pocket. The machines have a battery life of up to 16 hours which allows a parking attendant can operate the whole day without worrying about charging facilities. Customers who use the A-POS machine will no longer get printed receipts, as these are sent to their mobile phone via SMS making them very eco-friendly.
Speaking at the event, BancABC CEO, Dr. Lance Mambondiani said: “We are excited to partner with the Harare City Council in providing digital payment solutions to facilitate quick and convenient payments to members of the public. This is just the beginning, we will be rolling out further payment innovations through these platforms shortly and also extend this smart partnership to include financial solutions to some of the projects that the council is working on to improve service delivery in the city and make our contribution as financial intermediators”.
“We are also happy to announce that we have made significant progress in concluding similar partnership arrangements with other councils across the country. Despite the challenging economic times, partnerships such as this improves collaboration allowing us to build and progress faster as a nation” Mambondiani added.
The Bank which appears to be going through a significant transformation, has recently awakened as a significant player in the financial sector through smart partnerships in the various sectors of the economy which include agriculture and manufacturing sectors.
Harare Mayor, Herbert Gomba speaking at the event, commended BancABC for partnering with the Council to improve rate collections which he said will improve service delivery across the council’s banking Halls.
As part of the partnership, BancABC Country Head of Digital Payments Paul Banga announced the launch of the “Cut Above The Rest” Campaign where each month 10 lucky customers will have their bill cut by 10-20%. In order to qualify a customer simply has to swipe on a BancABC POS Machine using any Zimswitch enabled card. Any council payments from RTGS$200 – $1000 per month qualify during this campaign. He encouraged customers to request the A-POS machine when paying their city parking fees. The campaign encourages customers to pay their utility bills on time & stand a chance to win back 10% of their monthly council bill.
The bank has also launched an exciting social media competition where customers stand a chance to win 1 Year of Free Parking when using an A-POS machine to pay for their parking
