Bank Alfalah & PayFast collaborate to disrupt online payments

KARACHI - Bank Alfalah and PayFast have joined hands to enable MasterCard Payment Gateway Services (MPGS) on PayFast’s payment gateway with the objective of transforming the financial services sector in Pakistan. The partnership will make PayFast the only payment gateway solution in Pakistan to offer multiple financial instrument acceptance i.e. bank accounts, mobile wallets and scheme cards such as UnionPay and now Visa and MasterCard.

 With the COVID 19 pandemic, the need for digital payments has increased exponentially. This partnership between PayFast and Bank Alfalah will thus offer acceptance of domestic and international Visa & MasterCards to PayFast’s E-Commerce merchant’s ecosystem. The ambition is to make online payments seamless and frictionless for online shoppers.

Speaking about this partnership, Bank Alfalah representative Mr. Syed Muhammad Asif, Head of Unsecured Business, said "We at Bank Alfalah are pleased to collaborate with PayFast to branch out online payments further. This will help in creating a smooth and safe experience for digital transactions for users across the country, which will be a step forward in making cashless transactions more popular."

Bank Alfalah is one of the largest private banks in Pakistan with a network of over 700 branches in more than 200 cities across Pakistan with an international presence in Bangladesh, Afghanistan, Bahrain and a representative office in the UAE. The Bank is owned and operated by the Abu Dhabi Group. The International Finance Corporation (IFC) of the World Bank partnered with the Bank in 2014 and holds a 15 per cent stake in Bank Alfalah. The Bank provides financial solutions to consumers, corporations, institutions, and governments through a broad spectrum of products and services, including corporate and investment banking, consumer banking and credit, securities brokerage, commercial, SME, AgriFinance, Islamic Banking, and Asset Financing.

Mr. Adnan Ali, CEO, APPS, said, "Bank Alfalah shares the same vision with us for creating a cashless society and MPGS integration with our Checkout will play a catalyst role in E-commerce payment acceptance. This partnership further diversifies payment methods of PayFast as we can also accept Visa and MasterCard Debit & Credit Cards for our online merchant partners. This will allow us to continue our quest in fighting cash and resolving the bottlenecks faced by merchants while embracing the digital era.”

The mission of PayFast is to create a digital payment platform and offer acceptance of multiple payment instruments, instant onboarding, Robust APIs and 24/7 ready support & request to pay/invoicing-based payments through a payment link. PayFast has also partnered with UnionPay International to innovate mobile payment in Pakistan by upgrading Bank’s Mobile Apps for QR & Contactless Payments.