Paynet Group excited with progress in Kenya's migration to secure payments through EMV Chip cards

 

- Daring risk in the Migration to EMV Chip

With the "old black striped cards" known as the Magnetic Stripe cards blamed for wanton card fraud bedeviling the East Africa  banking and card payments industry, companies such as Paynet Group of Kenya have developed products that are supporting banks in safely migrating their card-payments businesses to the EMV Chip platform. The migration to EMV Chip is fraught with transitional risks, and will involve replacement of customers card with a different kind that uses a computer chip to securely encryption customer data. 

According to Julia Matthewman (above, left and below) Managing Director of Paynet Group the risks in the migration to EMV Chip in East Africa can be equated to the spectacle of the Wildebeests migration in the Maasai Mara. "The crocodiles in this migration process is costs incurred in expensive upgrades,  customer related risks and a labored process for individual banks that will have to get the payment card industry data security standards certification," she said. Paynet Group, the region's largest card processing facility  which has been running  successful credit/debit card operations for banks has already signed up four major Kenyan banks and at least one more bank in South Sudan in an outsourcing arrangement for the EMV Chip debit/ credit card operations.

According to Julia, banks need not risk in the transition to the more secure cards: "Banks will definitely consult with leaders in the industry over  how best to undertake this migration. We have invested over USD 5 million in this kind of expertise and capacity," she said during the recently concluded  Banking and Mobile Money Conference where Paynet Group won a price for innovation and quality.