Equity Bank has integrated Western Union services on its Equity Mobile application and its Equity Online banking service, part of a new partnership with the global money transfer operator that increases the Kenyan lender’s footprint in the international money transfer space.
For years, Equity Bank had already been the go-to place for direct hard cash withdrawals from PayPal, giving freelancers and others who received payments via the platform a lifeline. The bank currently faces competition from Safaricom which has been supporting instant withdrawals from PayPal for years now.
“This partnership now allows customers to conveniently send and receive international money transfers, through Western Union, straight from their devices,” the bank says in a statement.
“Equity Bank (Kenya) customers can access the service conveniently from almost anywhere, enabling them to send funds through Equity Mobile App or Equity Online directly to the receiver’s bank account around the world, as well as other Equity Bank accounts around the region, and also as a cash pick up transaction to be collected from any Western Union agent across more than 200 countries and territories.”
“Equity customers can also receive money conveniently, from almost anywhere around the world, by simply inputting the tracking number (MTCN) and other relevant details on the app. The money transfer can be deposited into the receiver’s preferred Equity bank account.”
The Equity Bank app is the replacement to the bank’s popular Eazzy Banking application that it has since sunset.
Unlike the Eazzy Banking app which was constantly in limbo when a new version of Android came out, forcing users to wait for months after upgrading their devices in order to have a functional app when Equity’s developers or software suppliers finally updated it, the current Equity Bank app appears to take everything in its stride rather briskly. For instance, the transition from Android 12 to Android 13 has been rather smooth, surprising for a local bank.
That said, Equity’s online banking platforms haven’t been without fault, at least as far as reports making the rounds in the media and social media go. Claims of the disappearance of customer funds under dubious circumstances that are often blamed on a mix of the usage of the bank’s online platforms by bad actors, as well as social engineering, have risen sharply over the past year and risk ruining the lender’s reputation amongst its clientele.
