Ever wondered to not carry cash around but also didn’t have access to a debit or credit card? You don’t have to worry about it because SimSim, is another mobile wallet but free, that offers you the digital money in your phone.
Your smartphone has been an element that accompanies you most of the time in a day. Anywhere you go, it goes along with you. So why not it be a facilitator to make your payments an easy task in occasions where you don’t have cash, credit/debit card or in fact you don’t want to pay in cash.
Mobile Payments are around in the world for quite a few years. They vary in concept of transferring money from one to another. There are services which directly connect with your bank account or credit/debit card, your mobile phone acts as an agent to pay from your accounts without the use of physical cards or cheques. Some services use carrier billing that you pay instantly with your phone and your mobile network adds those charges in your monthly bills. There are tens of payment models currently in use by mobile payment service providers. We really don’t want to indulge into all of those right now. The model we are talking here is a kind of mixture of a few.
Runs on the front of a Bank Account
Even though I’ve had an experience with SimSim very recently, it was launched last year in May after the approval from State Bank of Pakistan. The back bone of the service is the FINCA Microfinance Bank which is operating in many cities of the country. It holds the money you own, pays on behalf of you to third parties, all without having a single visit of yours to the bank. All you need is to download the app, install it and register yourself with your mobile no. and your national identity. The service opens your account and your mobile no. becomes your account number.
You make a payment with your SimSim mobile wallet by scanning a simple QR code at the payee side. It’s the real time money you have in your mobile account, which is deducted and transferred to the payee instantly. In addition to the payments, you can transfer money to other SimSim users or Finca account holders via their registered mobile numbers. Not only that, you have option to inter-bank funds transfer with only a minor fee.
While most of the payments you make through your SimSim mobile wallet are free of additional charges, it does charge you a fee of fixed Rs. 8/- per transaction for inter-bank funds transfers only if the transferring amount exceeds Rs. 10,000/- Well paying Rs. 8 for 10k is really nothing.
Similar Services
But hold-on, there are other payment services similar to what SimSim is offering, specially when every other mobile network owns its own micro financing bank. Some providers offer a little more facilities over other counterpart. You can transfer funds to other entities and make payments likewise.
In fact NFC payment solutions are also there but they are’t a mainstream medium in Pakistan as masses would use a smartphone that won’t have NFC chip. The bad thing about their services is the high-cost of inter-service funds transfers as well as their services are much cluttered within their respective packages.
Cash-Back Discounts
Anyhow, the recent experience of mine with SimSim’s mobile wallet I learnt that it offers discounts at well-known or less-known restaurants and shops around. The service providers are marketing more actively in festivals. If you participate, you can avail special instant cash-back discounts. One such example is the recent Coke fest happened last week in Lahore where I saw most of the booths offering payments via SimSim with discounts. Most of all, the user experience of the app is extremely friendly.
It’s true that services like this will not replace the cash payments at whole anytime soon. But having an option to pay through other means specially when their are discounts, it’s a good deal to have. Do let us know about your experience with any of the similar services in the comments below.
