A new locally developed app lets motorists and truck drivers who are part of fleets pay for petrol or diesel at a number of participating fuel stations using their smartphones.
The Payment24 fuel app is a white-label product, used by banks and petroleum companies, which can be rebranded, customised and deployed rapidly.
It works using geolocation and can tell when a driver is filing up and at which station. The driver then only needs to put in the number of the pump they are at, to authorise filling and payment.
The payment will be drawn from a pre-loaded mobile wallet, either filled by the motorist or the company they work for.
Payment24 says this is a more secure form of payment as the money is not directly linked to a credit or debit card. Also, limits can be predetermined and multiple users can be managed from a single dashboard. This means a parent can track and manage a family's fuel expenses, or the owner of a fleet can do the same with employees.
The app is already in operation in other parts of Africa: the UN headquarters in Kenya and Standard Bank in Namibia.
Payment24 will soon launch in SA in partnership with two major oil companies, although Payment24 declined to name these.
"Unfortunately, we are not allowed to make an official announcement as the companies are planning on making a public announcement within the next few weeks," says joint-CEO Shadab Rahil.
"Expanding on our growth in the fuel and transport sectors, our partnership with oil companies and banks takes the advanced payment solution to the mobile phones of consumers and small business owners for the first time.
"South African consumers and small business owners can now use this advanced fuel management and payment solution to reserve funds for fuel, speed up the payment process, control and track fuel expenditure by family members and employees, manage accounts and generate logs.
"In our pilot projects, customers reported a significantly improved experience and said they appreciated not having to hand over credit or debit cards or carry cash for fuel purchases," says Rahil.
Payment24 has been around since 2013 with its fuel management platform. The mobile app is the latest addition to its product offering.
After the local launch of the payment app, Payment24 plans to roll out the app internationally as a white-label product.
The service can also be embedded into banks' and petroleum companies' existing apps, with no specialised infrastructure required.
"The mobile app reduces the cost and complexity of managing payment terminals on the forecourt, cuts the cost per transaction, enhances payment security and reduces time at the pumps," says joint-CEO Nolan Daniel.
"In addition, by ensuring only the correct grade of fuel is authorised, petrol grade errors (traditionally a significant expense item) are reduced."
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