Imagine you could just text someone money! How cool would that be? Well, Sagicor is working on a new digital wallet that would allow you to do just that, but you may never get to use it!

So I know the internet doesn’t like when I talk about anything remotely related to going cashless but…

Sagicor Group and the University of Technology have announced their new digital wallet called SwifPay. 

SwifPay will reportedly work like any other mobile wallet; you’ll be able to store, send and receive money. But what’s cool about it, is that it’s being built on an SMS first strategy. 

That means customers will be able to use SMS, which is just regular texting, to sign up and transfer money without ever having to download a SwifPay mobile app.

Apple has a similar feature tied to its digital wallet.

A digital wallet, sometimes called a mobile wallet, is pretty much the same as a regular one. It can hold money, ID information, health cards etc, just in a digital form; think Apple or Google Wallet. 

And this area of fintech is booming in Jamaica because the country launched its central bank digital currency, JAM-DEX, last year.

Right now, Lynk, which is backed by NCB, is the only digital wallet that can hold JAM-DEX. But that could change soon. JN Group and Digicel have both announced that they’re working on wallets and now we can add Sagicor to the mix.

What’s really great about the SMS strategy that the SwifPay team is using is that it could really help the unbanked and underbanked.  One of the perks of digital wallets, is that they’re supposed to increase accessibility and bring more people into the formal banking system.

With this SMS feature, people who do not have a consistent internet connection, smartphone, or even a bank account can still be included.

Now SwifPay is still in its pilot phase and will be tested on UTech’s campus in the upcoming semester. According to the SwifPay team, the decision to release the wallet to the public will depend on how it’s received on campus.

So if the UTech students don’t use it enough, we might never get the chance to try it out. And it makes sense, this type of work takes a lot of funding, so of course they’d want to make sure it’s viable before branching out.