Tag: Company News

Ever since we at Hubtel heard Baffour Awuah Tabury’s touching story on Citi FM, we have made it one of our 2017 goals to “Make Baffour Walk Again.” 

Before everything changed on the road to realizing his dreams and making his mother proud, Baffour was a final-year student at the University of Cape Coast and getting ready to graduate. He was involved in a motor accident that left him paralyzed from his waist down in 2007. Due to this unfortunate turn of events, Baffour had difficulty controlling his urine and bowels. Like any loving and caring mother will do, Baffour’s mum resolved to do everything in her power to see her son walk again. This included burning over GHS 200,000 of her personal savings and investments on various procedures and two surgeries in Ghana. Last year, Baffour successfully had another surgery in China which restored his urinary and bowel control. 

For Baffour to walk again, the next step will be to undergo physiotherapy at NextStep Orlando (no pun intended). This physiotherapy center in Orlando, Florida treats patients who have injured their spinal cords so they can fully recover their functions. Amazing right? Yes, but this procedure will cost a cool GHS 87,000 ($19,200). And this is where Hubtel comes in. 

We have developed a Point of Sale platform called the Hubtel POS. This platform is tailored to allow businesses to accept payments and charity organizations to receive funds from all mobile money wallets and bank cards in their stores, online, or on the go into one account. With our POS, we eliminate the burden of having to hold four different phone numbers to receive payments. Making it easier for everyone who is touched to help resolve situations like Baffour’s, to make a donation to help Baffour walk again. 

So now how do I donate to this cause? It’s simple – just dial *713*7140# on your phone – it doesn’t matter which network you’re on, follow the instructions, and make a donation. Think of it this way: if 8,700 individuals make a donation of GHS10, Baffour’s dream of walking again will be realized. 

Hubtel has not only provided this shortcode to ease Baffour’s access to donations for his surgery, but we are also waiving all network charges associated with mobile money transfers made to this donation.  

So go ahead. Dial *713*7140# let’s make Baffour walk again! 

May 2020 Product Update

The New Face of Inventory, Instant Settlement & More…

See what’s new in this update:

Introduction of Warehousing

Just as you store the supplies you receive in a warehouse before you start selling, now you can stock your virtual warehouse before you start selling.

Adding items to multiple branches

Your virtual warehouse also makes distribution of items to multiple branches quicker and easier.

Adding items with variations

Details of multiple items that come in different sizes, colors or weight can now be added once; add the details of the items first, then add the details of all the variation types available.

How does this work? 

A Café that sells Voltic in three variations; small, medium and large bottles will be required to indicate the details below when adding this item: 

Add basic details

• Name 
• Category 
• Description 
• Expiry Date 

Then add variation details 

• Size 
• Selling Price 
• Cost Price  
• Quantity 

The number of variation details entered will be based on the number of varieties this item has. 

This also makes it easier for customers to view different colors or sizes of items on the same page, for them to pick and choose as they may desire.

Instant Bank Settlement

Access funds transferred to your bank account instantly. Funds from your bank transfer requests are now available on the same day!

ECG Postpaid Bill Payment Service

You and your customers can enjoy the convenience of confirming bill details before payment is done.
Resell this service from your Hubtel POS app or by using the
Commission services API.

Accra – Ghana’s indigenous eCommerce & SMS messaging company, Hubtel.com, has donated furniture and equipment valued at Eighty Thousand Cedis (GHS 80,000) to support the refurbishment of a new call center. The call center is an initiative of the Ministry of Communication in the fight against Covid-19.

Hubtel.com made the donation in response to requests made by the Minister of Communications, Hon. Ursula Owusu-Ekuful, at a recent press briefing urging the private sector to augment the government’s efforts at making accurate, reliable information about this novel virus accessible to the public. By ensuring the flow of useful information, the ministry hopes to improve early detection, reporting, and surveillance, and provide an avenue for prompt interventions. The donation which was received at the National Information Technology Agency (NITA) on behalf of the Minister by its Director General, Richard Okyere-Fosu, and his Deputy Director General, Kwaku Kyei Ofori, included office furniture, laptops, call center headsets, Covid-19 sanitation materials and several meters of network cables.

The donation forms part of Hubtel’s commitment to invest in the fight against the Covid-19 pandemic by ensuring that staff, customers, suppliers, and the community at large are supported in diverse ways to stay safe. In her note of acknowledgment, the Minister of Communication stated that “It’s a remarkable gesture. I have the utmost pleasure of saying ‘Thank you’, to Hubtel on behalf of the government and people of Ghana”. The Minister further commented that the donation will go a long way to help set up the unit.

Speaking at the presentation, the General Manager of Hubtel, Ernest Apenteng emphasized that “Our donation to this call center is motivated by people’s desire for accurate, credible and timely information about Covid-19, especially in this era where so much fake news and information abounds.” “Hubtel’s contribution in this war is to give support to those areas that we are not doing so well for lack of poor information delivery, for example, some recovered patients are reportedly been stigmatized on return to their communities. And there are many to whom access to essential information is not so simple. Therefore, we have committed to prioritize delivering information on these essential needs.”

Present at the donation were some management and staff members of Hubtel who urged the general public to continue to heed the health advice by maintaining physical distancing, wearing face masks,s and washing hands regularly. They also urged the public to use technology services as much as possible to avoid personal contact.

Ghana has confirmed over 5000 cases of the novel coronavirus and 22 deaths. In the wake of the pandemic, the government has put in place measures to help with containment, treatment, and accurate information dissemination.

The Covid-19 call center is set up to respond to inquiries from the public about the virus. The center can be reached via 0307007001

Thank you for making us a part of your business and lifestyle.

Kokomlemle, Accra. May 12, 2020 — This month, indigenous e-commerce and SMS messaging company, Hubtel is celebrating 15 years of helping businesses connect meaningfully with customers. From its humble 2005 beginnings, Hubtel has grown into a vibrant and nimble company with over 80 employees.

In the buildup to this anniversary, Hubtel has positioned itself to dominate e-commerce just as it’s done with its transformational work in fintech and bulk messaging. In 2019, the company overhauled its entire eCommerce infrastructure and released an impressive set of features for retailers and their customers; seamlessly merging the shopping experience in-store, online, and on mobile.

A growing number of neighborhood shops, popular restaurants, retailers, grocery stores, and service providers are making their products and services available to customers on hubtel.com; as consumers change lifestyles and routines to Internet-first.

As businesses and individuals buckle under a pandemic and scramble for technology to work, shop, sell, connect with family and friends, entertain, or find community, technology’s power to improve our lives has never been more evident. Hubtel is best placed to help businesses of all sizes, transition from brick-and-mortar to clicks and orders with fast same-day delivery.

“Looking forward to the future,” CEO, Alex Bram clarifies “Our continuing success as an organization is dependent on our ability to continue to retain the confidence and trust businesses have in us. We will keep improving obsessively, not just our platforms and infrastructure, but our people, our values, and our culture!”

“We want to be Africa’s most-loved shopitality platform; helping retailers sell and deliver to nearby communities, whiles blurring the lines between in-store and online shopping for consumers.”

For more information, visit blog.hubtel.com/updates

Africa Fintech firms and banks have called for a consolidated effort to provide as much information and access to digital information as a way of evolving the payment ecosystem under coronavirus (Covid-19).

The call was made during a webinar session COVID-19 Pandemic discussed by African Tech Leaders’ Outlook: under the topic: “The Fintech Outlook: How will the Payments landscape evolve?”

The 2 hour session moderated by Adedoyin Odunfa, CEO Digital Jewels, was attended by Dr. Diane Karusisi, CEO Bank of Kigali; among other Managing Directors like Michell Elegbe, Interswitch Group; Alex Bram, Hubtel, ; Agnes Gathaiya, CEO IPSL Kenya.

During the discussions, panelists said that the coronavirus pandemic lock down caught the financial and fintech sector unprepared but has left them with lessons to enable the sectors improve especially in payments and clients digital experiences.

Karusisi said that with the current Covid-19 lockdown Africans need to build an eco-system that brings aboard clients digital engagement to shift trends of clients having to walk to agents and bank branches to make payments or withdraw money.

Using her experience in Rwanda, Karusisi said during the Covid-19 lockdown, it has been difficult to process all the information and needs of clients who applied for digital services almost at the same time.

“There is a lot to be done and there is change in client’s digital behavior at this time, of which we have been overwhelmed by the demand for services when the partial covid-19 lockdown was announced,” Karusisi said.
Karusisi called on fintechs and banks to look for better solutions moving forward without waiting for clients to ask for them.

As part of the solution to this Karusisi said that Bank of Kigali has embarked on building interactive interfaces (between financial institutions) which are user friendly, to mitigate the challenge of being understaffed to meet each of the client’s needs.

So far in Rwanda, banks like BK have managed to integrate personal bank data with the mobile money subscription services offered by telecommunication companies, and the Rwanda Central Bank has scrapped all service fees on points of sale and on mobile money sending.

Karusisi also suggested that fintech should use the data collected on clients’ needs to create a tailor made digital payment plan for each of the clients since not all clients were equally affected by the lockdown.

Other panelists also agreed with her suggestion but insisted on building trust of clients on their financial data and how it is used with accountability and transparency.

For example Alex Bram, CEO Hubtel in Ghana said the country has faced a challenge of access to client financial information, but with their central bank trusting and opening up data to fintech companies they have managed to ease movement of clients from bank to bank.

“We thus have to be more open on transactions to increase trust of clients. Openness empowers clients to trust us. They will not need to go to the banks or branches and this will make us invest more in digital tech to see more change,” Bram said.

For Agnes Gathaiya, CEO IPSL Kenya, she said that client digital experience has to be the main focus of changing the rudiment financial payment systems (of going to the banks) before coronavirus into effective trusted digital payments.

“Once a person has tasted a user friendly and trusted digital payment system, they get caught up in it, and can never go back; unless it is not trusted. So fundamentally we should have clients use these systems and stay there,” Gathaiya.

Africa’s fintech ecosystem raised $320m and grew a 60% in the last two years accounting for approximately $395.7 million accounts out of a global total of $866 million- equivalent to 46% of global mobile money.

Interestingly, despite having the highest level of mobile phone and internet penetration, only 10% of all payments and transactions in the continent are based on technology.

Source

The inaugural list of the 2019 50 Most Influential CMOs in Ghana compiled by Avance Media, Reset Global People and Afiba Consulting, has been recently released.

The list, which was not ranked recognized the works of CMOs who are motivating performance, broadening markets, creating new trends, impressive financial performance in the Ghanaian market as well as brand perception.

A team from Avance Media today presented a placard to Elsie Bram, CMO of Hubtel as part of this exercise.

21 of the 50 people listed are women. Sectors considered cut across media, technology, banking & finance, insurance, food & beverage, telco, oil & gas, among others.

Transforming local corner stores into all-purpose neighborhood service points. 

ACCRA, GHANA – November 21, 2019 – Hubtel, Ghana’s first fully integrated business retail system, and messaging service provider, today announced a series of new features for retailers and their customers at its 2019 Rethink – Keynote Edition, which was attended by more than 100 businesses.   

Hubtel as an  eCommerce platform has been expanding in innovative ways focused on helping businesses of all sizes with tools to accept payments, engage customers and improve service delivery.   

In its biggest update since the company’s rebrand in May 2017,  Hubtel has released several features including an all-new inventory management system, with functionalities to manage both tangible products and digital services as well as generate notifications for stock movements and expiry.   

The latest updates also include insights for sales, customer visits/purchases, and employee management. The company also announced new interfaces for bulk SMS services on its new platform – with advanced options to schedule and automate messages for future delivery.  

The company since 2005 has delivered billions of business-critical SMS messages and pioneered mobile banking and online payments in Ghana. Its latest feature release includes a new ISO 8583 compatible banking system to assure proper accounting and hourly settlements of all payments. This has enabled retailers using Hubtel to gain full control over their transfer schedules. Payments received from retailers’ customers on Hubtel via bank card, QR, or mobile money can be transferred to any connected mobile wallet or bank account on daily, weekly, or monthly schedules. 

“In preparing towards regulation and increased capacity to manage higher merchant sales volumes, the company has since June 2018 embarked on a major overhaul of nearly all our systems. The overhaul has also included several improvements to user interfaces…” says Alex Bram, Chief  Executive Officer at Hubtel. 

The company also released two infomercials about the work it did towards the release of its new platform and how Hubtel’s product development teams worked with customers to create the latest features.  

A capstone to the event was the release of a new feature to allow the sale and distribution of commission-based digital services. This marks a fresh beginning for service providers to integrate their service for immediate distribution to all retailers and customers on Hubtel. Some services already integrated on Hubtel include airtime on all networks, Surfline, Busy, GHIPSS Instant Pay, and many other utility services.

“It’s really exciting that we can now provide our customers a comprehensive platform that allows them to attract customers, handle inventory, optimize sales, with integrated messaging, one-click online web store, and deliveries into one simple very inexpensive solution for all types of payment,” says Hans Nilsson, Board Chairman at  Hubtel. 

For more information, visit blog.hubtel.com/updates

5 Schools in Accra Receive ICT Equipment from Hubtel 

Hubtel, Ghana’s leading bulk messaging and e-commerce platform provider, has donated ICT equipment to 5 schools in the Greater Accra Region as part of the company’s social responsibility commitments. 

Hubtel is Ghana’s first tech company to become a member of the globally acclaimed Pledge 1% in 2017. By this, Hubtel pledged to give 1% of profits, 1% of products, and 1% of paid employee time towards charitable courses. 

According to the founders of Pledge 1%, “the initiative is a global movement to create a new normal in which giving back is integrated into the DNA of companies of all sizes. Pledge 1% encourages and challenges individuals and companies to Pledge 1% of equity, profit, product, and/or employee time for their communities.”   

The items donated to the 5 schools included laptops, projectors, projector screen stands, speakers, microphones, internet routers, and other computer peripherals. The schools were selected by employees of Hubtel after several visits to understand the challenges the schools face in the teaching and learning of information technology subjects. 

The first donation at the St Paul Primary & Junior High School, Kpehe – Accra New Town, was received by the assistant headmaster of the school. Also present were the Chairperson of the PTA and a section of the school pupils.  

Making the donations at St Paul Primary & JHS, Alex Bram, CEO of Hubtel emphasized that “We [Hubtel] ultimately want to transform the time for teaching and learning ICT into one filled with memorable moments and lots of fun. Schoolchildren should not be intimidated by technology.  What we are doing is to provide early access to quality computer education for these pupils. We wish to see more school children take computing programs at higher levels because we believe the illiterates of the future will be people who cannot use computers”. 

Other schools that received similar donations were Liberty Avenue 2 JHS at Adabraka, Dr. FV Nanka-Bruce Junior High at Korle-Gonno, the Nima Cluster of Schools, and the Bethel AME Zion JHS at Ashaiman.  

These schools either had one PC for teaching and learning or none at all. In coming to the aid of the schools, school officials expressed relief and gratitude for the donations. Mr Michael Owusu, Assistant Headmaster at the St Paul Primary and JHS speaking to journalists after the donations was beside himself with joy, ”It really feels special. For more than three years, we’ve made frantic efforts to acquire these items with little success. Now, our pupils can have a real chance to understand better what they are taught. This is a moment of pride for us”.

Hubtel was founded in May 2005 on the campus of Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology, Kumasi. In its 14 years of operation, the company has carved a reputation as a trusted and admirable tech brand across Africa. Starting with a bulk SMS messaging platform, the company has evolved into the e-commerce space – offering businesses tools to enhance the customer shopping experience; in-store, online, and mobile.  

In becoming a signatory to Pledge 1%, Hubtel joined the ranks of Silicon Valley giants like Salesforce, Yahoo, Box, Glassdoor, DocuSign, and other leading companies in over 100 countries.

September 2019 Product Update

Customers. Sales. Reviews. Security

See what’s new in this update:

Feedback & Inbox

Know what your customers think and feel about your business

Invoice Additions

Add taxes, levies, or other service charges a customer may have to pay as part of a sale

API Security Alerts

API Customers now receive notifications on any unauthorized (HTTP 401 or HTTP 403) attempt on accounts

Filter by Expiry Date

Filter items based on expiry dates. This requires that you add expiry dates to items; as part of product details in Advanced Options

Stock History

See all stock reduction activities when items are sold in-store, online, and on mobile

Feedback & Inbox
• Receive and instantly respond to customer Ratings and Feedback.
• Your customers will receive your response and can also reply from their inbox.

Invoice Additions
• Set up invoice additions for your items per branch. This can either be included in or excluded from the price.
• All invoice additions are added to the sub-total for your customer to pay.

Callback URL Check
Your callback URL may be down or timeout once in a while. This may happen when Sending money, Receiving money, or using the Hubtel checkout.
Check the status of any of these activities whenever you miss a callback:
1. Your own client reference
2. The Hubtel Transaction ID or Checkout
3. The Network Providers transaction ID

API Self-service
Manage your API credentials yourself. Get things done on your integrations swiftly and securely with Setup API Keys now in your control.
Visit Hubtel Integration to Add, Change or Delete API Keys.

PSP Regulatory Act, 2019 (Act 987)
PCI DSS and ISO 27001 certifications in progress to meet all new minimum requirements for Payment Service Providers issued by the Bank of Ghana.

Key Features
Add the most essential and interesting key details about each item as part of the product details in Advanced Options.

One of the biggest exhibition of professional and business leaders in the beauty industry happened this weekend at the Accra International Conference Center.

This first edition of the Hair Senta International Beauty show dubbed “HIBS Africa”, attracted vendors and exhibitors of hair and beauty products across the African continent and internationally.

The vision of HIBS Africa is to bridge the global divide and make African businesses in the beauty industry, globally competitive and successful.

Hubtel introduced exhibitors to the importance of offering convenient shopping experiences for their customers. Emphasizing the competitive advantage of online sales, electronic transactions and prompt service delivery.

Hubtel wins three awards at the just ended GITTA Awards ceremony, held on Friday June 28, 2019.

• Fintech Company of the Year
• Fintech CEO of the Year (Alex Bram)
• Emerging eCommerce Initiative of the Year

About GITTA Awards 

Now in its 9th year, the Ghana Information Technology & Telecom Awards (GITTA) is the most prestigious awards program in the industry. Most times called the “Oscar Awards”, it recognizes innovation and excellence. GITTA 2019, which has an independent panel of industry experts as judges, recognized organizational performances, products, services, innovations, executives and management teams, women in ICT, and CSR initiatives.

GITTA has become one of the industry’s most prized honours. It is an accolade given to individuals and teams and is a vindication of the hard work, innovation and dedication of those at the forefront of this dynamic global profession.