Safaricom, Internship the largest telecommunications company in East Africa has announced more changes in M-Pesa services.
On Friday 10 June Safaricom introduced changes that limit access to M-Pesa’s statements to customers.
Users were informed that they would no longer receive M-Pesa monthly statements via email from the operator. M-Pesa declarations will only be available upon request in the future. The changes will take effect on July 1, 2022.
M-Pesa monthly statements are currently being sent as PDF files to customers’ email addresses. However, customers must enter their ID number in order to view the data.
Users can also access their M-Pesa statements for the past three, six or twelve months at any time by dialing * 334 # and selecting “My Account”. Safaricom stated in a communication to consumers that this channel would remain the only option to see your M-Pesa statement
In recent months, the company has implemented a number of measures ostensibly to improve consumer privacy and safety, in response to growing customer concerns about protecting their data.
Earlier this year it announced plans to hide the identities of customers making payments through its Lipa na M-Pesa network, but this has since met with resistance.
The changes were supposed to go into effect at the end of June, but Safaricom ran into technical difficulties, causing the plans to fail.
Unlike now, when merchants can view consumer information such as their full registered name and phone number, Safaricom plans to only provide the customer’s name and a few digits of their phone number, essentially obscuring their identity.
