Daniel Oparison is the head of growth & consumer business at Paga. Over three million users now use Paga’s agent and online payment channels to send and receive money. In this interview with BEN UZOR, Oparison talks about the firm’s recipe for success amid the country’s harsh operating environment. He shed some light on the role of electronic payment in bringing about higher levels of transparency, accountability and efficiency in governance.
Pagatech has been in existence since the inception of CBN’s cashless. What impact has your company made on the payment landscape?
We are honoured and privileged to have played a massive role in developing the Nigerian payments landscape. Factually, we are the foremost payment company. We recorded about 800 percent of growth in our first full year of transactions in 2012. Our user base has grown to over 3 million. That’s testaments of the usage of our solution. I believe that in the lives of Nigerians we’ve made an impact. In industry, we are a major player.
We work with about 8, 000 agents. These are entrepreneurs in themselves – individuals who run their own businesses. These entrepreneurs sell anything from detergent, fish and even some pharmaceutical products. These individuals use Paga to enhance the lives of human being living in their community. These agent help Nigerians send money across the country, pay utility bills. We have the largest agent network. Over the years, we have enhanced the business of these individuals.
What are those factors responsible for Paga’s outstanding growth?
We were the first to reach and touch 1 million people. We are focused on the experience of our customers. It is simple to look at the numbers and say i just wanted this person to make a transfer, bill payment or buy airtime. That should work the first or second time. That person returns based on a certain experience. We have realised that every transaction with Paga is an opportunity to give customers a good experience. Our return rates, loyalty rates and repeat customers rated are high. We also focus on brand engagement and our push is transforming lives. The believe that we have a strong and robust product. It is flexible because we built it in-house from the ground up. We are constantly testing the product to make it better for the people. I think it is a combination of a good product and our focus on a happy experience for our customers.
Paga is becoming that link between commerce and economic development. Do you think that greater adoption of electronic payment will bring about higher levels of transparency, accountability and efficiency? Do you think it will address the issue of corruption?
A lot of what Paga does in digitising payment and offering ways to track and manage payments removes quite a bit of corruption. I won’t mention the name of the government parastatal, but we ran a project for a government parastatal. The government agency was trying to make sure that we were getting all the money paid to them. It was an outstanding success. Basically, we put Paga agents at the payment point within that organisation. It make a big difference because of the income the government agency was receiving compared with when it was just managed in-house. I believe that electronic payments makes a big difference by eliminating corruption and improving internal processes. We believe that Paga is an important link for commerce and economic growth. Small Medium Enterprises (SMEs) play a major part in the development of any economy. We see every agent of ours as an SME.
Already, we have 8, 000 SMEs. Part of the basis for partnering with them is that these entrepreneurs have running businesses or have started a running businesses. It is on that we layer Paga. We are creating quite a few other services to expand businesses. Daily, we are signing up new business that want do things as bulk payment to being able to receive money on their website. Some of these business does not have website but want to receive money electronically because the prospective buyer is another country. We launched Paga Pages. You simple come on board as a business, we auto create the page for you. So, without having website, you simply list out your product and attract the right buyers.
You don’t have to fork out the money required to build website. In comparison to many of our competitors, we kept our integration prices at zero. With the competition, you are paying around 75, 85 and 150, 000 for their payment gateway. Ours is zero. Even if you already have your website and you need integrate Paga, the start-up cost for that is zero. The same way we as a small business started, we want to enable other business to go digital and make and receive payment more effectively and efficiently.
Looking at the electronic payment industry, there are many players in the market. Do you think there is sufficient room for growth?
Nigeria is a huge market and the economy is expanding. We actually need more players. We welcome partnerships and competition. Through competition, we serve Nigerians better. Enough room does exist for growth even with certain businesses doing the same thing. We are focused on payments because we want Nigerians to use Paga at any point to make payment. An opportunity for growth because if you are able to satisfy the needs of the public and the public is grows, ultimately your business also expands.
Are there obstacles hindering the speedy adoption of mobile payment services?
We don’t see them as obstacles. We tend to see them as challenges because out of each one, it refines our process. It gives us an ideas of new service to work on. Technology is a big element hindering adoption of mobile payments. It is still a growing part of our economy. I don’t think the country has mastered it yet. In view of the interconnectedness of our industry, technology development is critical. In any payment activity, three players exists – bank, switch and the payment company. As an industry, we need to make sure that structure for interconnected technologies are always enhanced.
What’s the future of Pagatech ten years from now?
We are confident that mobile payments has a crucial role to play in Nigeria. We are focused on being a big part or even leading that growth. We continue to give customers innovative ways of solving their payment challenges. We continue to work with new and existing partners to expand the ecosystem. Our future should be greater version of our present as we continue to enable payments for business, families, etc. We want to transform lives through payment provisions.
