One of the most lucrative yet quite easy to operate
businesses in Kenya is the Mpesa agency business. Over the years, Mpesa has
become part of the Kenyan way of life. You therefore won’t have to spend a lot
of money in marketing your M-pesa agent business. You really just have to open
the door (to a green kiosk with a m-pesa agent label), and customers will start
trooping in straightaway.
In practical terms, there are 4 key steps you need to
follow, while setting up a mpesa business in Kenya.
First, you need to put together the required capital. You will
need money to acquire (rent/buy) the premises where you will be operating your
mpesa business from. You will also need money to acquire a mpesa line. Further you
will need money to ‘buy’ the float with which to operate and to acquire a business permit. And you may also need
some money to cater for the business costs before it picks up.
Second, having put together the required capital, you will
need to acquire the business premises. So this may be just a question of
approaching someone who is renting out premises at a location that is suitable
for a mpesa business, and getting him or her to give you space. Thankfully, the
mpesa business doesn’t require a lot of space.
The third step is to acquire the m-pesa line itself. This is
a fairly straightforward process, and the Safaricom website has instructions on
how to go about it. The main thing you will be required to do at this step is
to provide a great deal of information about yourself. In terms of the required
information, it is almost as deep as the Kenya passport applicationform! But the actual procedure is as simple and straightforward as that of applying for a KRA pin online.
The fourth step is to acquire business license or business
permit for your Mpesa business. This you may be able to do online, if you are
in one of the Kenya counties that have online business permit application processes.
The fifth step is to recruit the person/people you are to work
with in operating the mpesa business (if you won’t be running it yourself). The
most important thing here is to get a trustworthy person, who is capable of
dealing with people nicely, and whose origin is traceable.
Then voila! You can open your mpesa shop door and start serving customers!
