Standard Bank has had a tenfold increase in instant payments, driven by increased uptake of digital payments platform PayShap.
In March 2023, BankservAfrica and the Payments Association of SA launched PayShap, which offers consumers cheap access to instant payments across participating banks using cellphone numbers.
BankservAfrica, Africa’s largest automated payments clearing house, processes bank card, ATM and EFT transactions between the country’s banks as part of SA’s national payments system.
The company has been working for years to implement a system that makes it simple for people to send and receive money across banks’ national payments system. This is part of a wider plan that includes cross-border payments.
Growth in PayShap is helping push Standard Bank’s digital payments strategy, with the bank saying on Tuesday it had had an increase in instant payments through PayShap, “while other immediate interbank transactions have continued to grow”.
Over the past year, the number of Standard Bank clients registering for PayShap grew 9%, and active use of ShapID for transactions had increased 817% year on year, the bank reported.
The numbers reflect a trend seen in the digital payments industry. Since its launch, the industry has processed more than 74.2-million PayShap transactions to the value of R46bn.
This indicates huge growth on the platform in 2024 as earlier in the year BankservAfrica reported that PayShap had recorded more than 14-million transactions, with a settlement value of more than R9bn from March 13 2023 to end-February.
Standard Bank said the growth in the use of PayShap ID accelerated sharply between the first and third quarters of this year, “demonstrating the rapid entrenchment of PayShap as a go-to payment method for Standard Bank clients”.
The average PayShap payment now stands at R498, down from R594 in the first quarter of 2024, said the bank.
Standard Bank’s head of payments in SA, Rufaida Hamilton, said this drop signalled a shift towards using PayShap for micropayments, demonstrating that the platform — designed for fast, low-cost transactions for everyday needs — was fulfilling its purpose.
“This data clearly shows that consumers are increasingly seeking more convenient payment solutions. They [also] want their transactions to clear instantly. Our other immediate interbank transactions, beyond PayShap, have continued to rise, highlighting a growing preference for instant payments.”
Industry players outside SA are also taking notice of PayShap.
Thomas Warsop, president and CEO of ACI Worldwide, recently told Business Day that the launch PayShap in SA had given the market a boost due to its cost-effectiveness.
Founded in 1975, ACI is credited with being one of the first major software providers to the payments industry. Listed on the Nasdaq, the company is worth $5.4bn (about R94bn).
A big part of Standard Bank’s strategy is to migrate customers to digital platforms. Digitally active retail clients in SA grew 7% in the six months to end-June. The volume of transactions increased 23%, while branch transactions fell 12%.
Standard Bank’s mobile app saw a 13% increase in the number of clients and more than 140-million logins per month in the half year. This resulted in a 33% increase in digital revenue.
Total technology function spending in the period stood at R11.05bn, up 2% from the previous comparable period. It amounts to an annualised spend of R22.1bn, in line with similar costs incurred for the 2023 full year.
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