Remittance transfer gets speed as WorldRemit teams up with BRAC Bank, bKash

London-based WorldRemit has expanded its presence in Bangladesh partnering with BRAC Bank and its subsidiary bKash.

WorldRemit’s Chief Commercial Officer Tamer El-Emary announced the partnership with the leading private bank and the largest mobile financial service provider on Tuesday.

“From speed, convenience and cost standpoint, we provide a better service to customers,” El-Emary told bdnews24.com in an exclusive interview.

Bangladesh is among the top five countries in the world with the most emigrants living abroad and is the ninth-largest recipient of remittances globally.

According to Bangladesh Bank, the country received almost $15 billion in remittances in 2017.

Established in 2010 as a start-up, WorldRemit has been sending money to Bangladesh since 2012. But its new partnership with BRAC Bank and bKash is being seen as a game-changer.

bKash has about 30 million money wallets and BRAC Bank has 1.5 million accounts.

New partnership with WorldRemit allows customers to receive remittances digitally directly into their BRAC Bank accounts, as cash over the counter at the bank branches and agent points, and into their bKash mobile wallets.

“This partnership considerably expands our footprints in Bangladesh and supports our plan to serve 10 million customers connected to emerging markets,” El-Emary said, adding that people from 50 countries can take their service to send money to at least 150 countries.

“We send from 50 countries to as many as 150 countries. It’s a global network,” he said.

“We have an app. You can also use the web service as well -- to send money.  We don’t handle cash or we don’t deal with agents,” he said. “The senders download our app, go online and send money.”

“We are a company that is digitising the remittance industry.”

“Recipients have several options either to receive by bank or mobile money account. They can also receive it from a cash pick-up location.”

The cost is cheaper than the other market players.

For example, if somebody in the UK wants to send £120 to Bangladesh, the industry average cost would be about 5 percent. “But for us, the cost will be 1.5 percent of the transaction,” he said.

“Difference is when you use traditional players you have to go physically there. You have to travel distances sometimes in order to send money,” El-Emary said.

“And also it takes time for the transaction to happen and receive. The recipients also have to travel and receive.”

 “We focus on providing g combination of benefits -- faster, more convenient and cheaper.”

El-Emary said the new partnership in Bangladesh will also “support financial inclusion by enabling the unbanked Bangladeshi people to receive remittances straight into their mobile money accounts”.

Eight-year-old WorldRemit also wants to go public sometime in the next couple of years.

It has grown rapidly since Ismail Ahmed, a onetime refugee from war-torn Somalia, developed a service to send money electronically from UK residents to recipients in Africa. The company was valued at $670 million in December last year.

The $600 billion global remittance market, long a paper-driven process that saddled low-income users with steep fees, was ripe for digital disruption.