Bank Alfalah,Techlets sign MoU to boost 10,000 work opportunities

KARACHI - Bank Alfalah and Techlets have jointly agreed to deliver an innovative and fully integrated financial solution on Walee, a mobile app and web platform (www.waleepk.com) serving Pakistan’s largest influencer marketing platform with more than 50,000 users across more than 250 cities.

“Walee, Pakistan’s everyday trade app”, operated by Techlets was launched at Influencers of Pakistan Lahore forum (www.influencersofpakistan) in November 2019 to help businesses, digital influencers, and resellers manage, measure, and monetize their e-retail collaborations using mass sales and marketing capabilities.

Bank Alfalah will facilitate online payment collection on Walee’s digital platforms through Alfa Payment Gateway, also aiding in signing up the interested SMEs and influencers as merchants for an instant merchant account or full-fledged merchant business accounts for the collection of payments online through their own digital channels. Lastly, Bank Alfalah will support opening Alfa Accounts for these influencers so they can collect payments in these accounts and perform their everyday banking. Besides, SMEs and influencers who are interested in availing payment gateway services for online payment collection can also sign up for a merchant account digitally and conveniently. Furthermore, SMEs and influencers who have signed up as merchants with Alfa Payment Gateway can also later avail merchant financing facilities.

Ahsan Tahir, CEO, Techlets explained businesses’ opportunities: “With COVID lockdowns driving record highs in digital content consumption - overall internet traffic in the country has increased by at least 15% according to PTA, with most bandwidth consumed by social media platforms. We have also seen both new and established businesses accelerate digitization of their operations and have been delivering cost-effective and impactful scaled influencer and sales programs from our trusted site – we aim to support at least 1,000 e-commerce sites by creating efficiencies and savings. By collaborating with Bank Alfalah, we will further strengthen payments for both businesses and influencers.  In addition, we are excited to partner on a mutual focus area -- financial inclusion by upskilling female influencers and women-led SMEs. For this group, we aim to strengthen our reach in second and third-tier cities, though Walee already covers about 70% of Pakistan geographically.”

Mr Adnan Nasir – Head of Digital Payments, Bank Alfalah said, “We continue to build on our innovative and flexible infrastructure to accelerate Pakistan’s digital payment growth using interoperable digital commerce payments and pioneer solutions with new and innovative partnerships, like with Techlets. We will also expand our transaction set by providing reliable and secure settlement services to influencers and businesses using Bank Alfalah accounts and wallets.”

With COVID-19 lockdowns impacting industries and causing substantial job losses, Bank Alfalah and Techlets aim to support and facilitate thousands of home-based employment opportunities and improve earning and financial management skills for at least 5,000 individuals in the next 12 months.  A refreshed online Bootcamp series will launch in July 2020 to train small businesses and individuals on how to use Walee to generate previously unavailable income streams, using e-commerce and to improve participants’digital financial literacy. In addition, Influencers of Pakistan will launch a ‘Power of Influencers’ series in July featuring Pakistan-based influencers and subject matter experts to share their experiences, industry insights and answer viewers’ questions.