Internet credit card processing solutions for tourism and travel in Southern Africa
From left: Robin Philip (PayGate), Zelda van der Colff (Standard Bank), Peter Harvey (PayGate), Xavier Masule (Air Namibia)
PayGate internet credit card processing solutions for tourism and travel in Southern Africa
PayGate attended the the Hospitality Association of Nambia conference in Windhoek by invitation of Standard Bank of Namibia Card Division, the sponsor of HAN for 20 years. Standard Bank's is committed to promoting and underwriting credit credit card acquiring for the tourism and travel industry in Africa. The theme of the conference was Megatrends in the Tourism industry. Peter Harvey, Managing Director of PayGate (Pty) Ltd as guest speaker shared PayGate's knowledge end experience in "Trends in Internet Credit Payment Solutions for the Tourism Industry" with specific reference to Southern Africa.
Peter has a BCom and over 19 years experience in the computer industry, specialising in architecture and development of eCommerce and online credit card payment solutions for a diverse range of clients in Southern Africa and internationally. Peter, with the help of his team and Standard Bank, developed one of the first ever credit card batch processing systems in South Africa. His passion for the internet, exceptional customer service and designing innovative industry standard solutions has led to his reputation as an authority on internet credit card processing solutions. Peter founded PayGate as one of the first credit card gateways in Southern Africa and his dedication and commitment to the industry has led to PayGate's entrenched leadership position as the gateway of choice in Southern Africa.
Peter showed some examples of the significant an continuing growth in travel and tourism and significant growth in the use of the internet for online bookings and credit card payments. More than 95% of PayGate tourism and travel merchants have shown solid growth in internet credit card processing and more than half of these merchants have grown by more than 100% in the past three years. The Tourism and Travel sector is one of the fastest growing industries on the internet. 95% of the Europeans will make their 2008 holiday bookings to Southern Africa online (source = InternetRetailing).
The forms of payment used to pay for holidays are International Cards (credit card), Domestic Cards (debit card), Bank Transfer Services (online banking), Local Card & Bank Alternatives (e.g. gift card) and Cash on Delivery (COD). Credit card is by far the most significant and fastest growing method of online payment (see graph).
Credit card payment as the fastest growing internet payment solution has brought with it the risk of fraud. Growth in credit card fraud has led to the introduction of MasterCard SecureCode and Verified by Visa and credit card risk screening to combat online credit card fraud. PayGate and Standard Bank have a conservative risk profile and together have strictly implemented SecureCode and Verified by Visa and/or fraud and risk screening. Credit card processing without fraud and risk prevention measures is like having sex without a condom. The consequences are inevitable, it is just a matter of time.
The growth of internet credit card payment in tourism and travel in Africa has been accelerated by many factors including
1. The mandatory eTicketing requirement in the airline industry, and Air Namibia a client of PayGate who is one of the first airlines outside South Africa to pioneer and implement internet airline flight bookings
2. The winning of the World Cup Rugby 2007 by the Springboks will highlight South and Southern Africa as the holiday destination of choice
3. The focus on South Africa for the 2010 World Cup Soccer will sustain this holiday destination trend for Southern Africa including Namibia and South Africa
PayGate is seeing good growth in the use of credit cards as a payment solution in Africa and is the best credit card processor to satisfy the unique needs of the tourism and travel industry looking for internet payment solutions that are perfectly suited to the African payment solutions environment. This has been further enhanced with Standard Bank Africa's (Stanbic Africa) planned rollout of credit card acquiring into Africa in 2008.
Date Created : 2007-11-02 | Last Update : 2007-11-06 |
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