Frequently Asked Questions
What is your relationship with Safaricom?
View introduction letterWe are an official partner of Safaricom. We co-market with Safaricom to promote the Buy Goods service with small and medium-sized businesses like you. In addition, as Kopo Kopo, we also provide you additional services such as making your transactions easily accessible online and through our mobile app and providing ways for you to better track and engage your customers.
How different is this from M-PESA Pay Bill?
Pay Bill is primarily meant for situations where the customer has an official relationship with the organization to whom they are making a payment and have an “account number” that helps identify users.
While Pay Bill is often used for remote and e-commerce payments, Buy Goods is meant for immediate purchase of goods and services and these payments are made on site and immediately confirmed. No relationship between the buyer and the organization or account number is required.
How is this different from M-Pesa Send Money?
It is more secure: customers cannot reverse transactions without your approval. It is cheaper and the fee structure is simple: 1.5% flat fee on all transactions.
How do I access my funds (how do I get paid)?
You can log into the Kopo Kopo platform at anytime and anywhere to request a settlement directly to a bank account or M-PESA account.
How much will it cost me?
Getting setup and having a till number assigned to you are totally free.
We charge a flat fee of 1.5% for all transactions. This is cheaper than the 3-5% fee most credit card companies charge and the 2% or much higher paid on transfer and withdrawal fees on M-PESA Send Money transactions of 10,000 KSH or less
The only expense you will need to install the product is the cost of a phone to be exclusively used to receive a payment (a very basic or old phone will do), signage and other setup expenses are on us.
How does Kopo Kopo benefit from this?
We receive a small cut of transactions in exchange for bearing the acquisition cost of merchants. In addition, we also make money when you use some of our value added services.
Our long term goal is to help your business grow by becoming a valued partner to you in processing all of your mobile payments and developing new innovative ways for you to interact with your customers.
Who uses your product?
We currently have thousands of clients using Kopo Kopo for various services. These include leading merchants such as Text Book Center, Officemart, Ashley’s, Mercury Lounge and Delvis.
How long does it take to process a transaction?
Transactions are real time and both you and your customer will receive a confirmation SMS right away to confirm that the transaction has been processed.
How secure is this? Can’t customers reverse transactions?
Kopo Kopo is secured by 256-bit encryption from VeriSign and our servers are PCI DSS Level One compliant. Customers cannot reverse transactions without your approval: a Safaricom agent will call your business to confirm whether the transaction can be reversed. This feature makes this a lot safer than receiving payments for goods or services on your personal M-Pesa account.
What is the application process and how long does it take?
We need some of your business information for our records and two signed agreement forms. Once your application is complete, within two weeks we can get you an account and your business will be fully setup and going.
I have multiple locations, do I need to get an account for each branch?
No, you only need one application for your business but you will need to fill an additional form to request separate till numbers for your different locations. Our data service is actually very useful for multi-location businesses where you can see if a customer transacts in multiple locations, compare performance of your different outlets etc (one of our clients has over 10 tills operating in Nairobi and Mombasa).
Does the Buy Goods service work for e-commerce websites?
The Buy Goods service does not work for e-commerce sites. We recommend you contact other vendors who can help you with e-commerce features. Please contact us for recommendations.
