EcoCash makes it easier to ask for money from friends and family, markets it terribly

We have all been there, you are a little short on money and need someone to bail you out. It’s a little awkward when you have to ask someone for a handout but what can you do when the need arises?

So, you shoot your benefactor a text message or a quick call. Or if you are in a real bind, you resort to a call me back request. The person calls you, a back and forth ensues as you plead your case and they tell you they can spare a little. The benefactor then has to go to their mobile banking app or mobile money wallet and make it official.

What if that last part was tweaked? See, a request for money is also a request for a benefactor to leave whatever they are doing and fiddle around in some app, or worse still, deal with USSD and timeouts. What if the one asking for money was the one to do all the heavy lifting?

EcoCash now allows for that.

Request money

I’m not sure when this became a thing but you can now request for money yourself and all the benefactor has to do is input a PIN.

This now works just like merchant transactions work. You know how in supermarkets you don’t have to deal with USSD when you’re the one paying. The supermarket wants your money and does the heavy lifting. Granted, the request is now automated in those cases.

In your case, you have to do it manually and this is how you do it:

• Dial *151#

• Select Option 1: Send Money

• Then Option 3: Request Money

• Then Option1: Create Request

• Enter Amount

• Enter your benefactor’s number and reference

Your benefactor gets a prompt to approve the transaction. It is just like the prompt one gets when they want to pay a merchant. If the benefactor recognises the name and amount, they input their PIN and that’s that.

If the benefactor misses the prompt, a text message follows with the information. They can then use the short code *151*1*6*3# to get straight to all pending transactions.

At any point you can go to the Request Money menu and view your Initiated Requests and Received Request. Or just to make another request.

Neat feature

It’s a neat little feature despite EcoCash’s cringe ad stereotyping the young girl asking for money from her ‘Bae.’

EcoCash Ad says: ‘A new way to ask Bae for money’ and shows a young lady smiling whilst on her phone, asking her bae/blesser for money I presume.

Not to say the stereotype isn’t true, just that you wouldn’t expect EcoCash to ride on it. In this age of Only Fans and Insta Modelling, why should EcoCash promote the bae/blesser dynamic? Turns out not all were impressed with this ad campaign and they let EcoCash know on social media.

One other issue raised was that this feature could become a nuisance if abused. Imagine getting these requests every other minute. I can see why it might be good idea to give people the option to opt out of receiving money requests. Or at the very least to block certain numbers.

To be frank though, this is not an EcoCash problem. If your contacts abuse something that would be useful for others, that’s on you and your phone number disbursement policy. Should we also get rid of ‘call me backs’ because someone’s sugarbaby abuses it? I think not.

So, go ahead and make life easier for those you beg from. Use EcoCash’s Request Money feature today.

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