Zain Jordan hits success with ‘E-mal’

The “E-mal” service, a new mobile technology-based banking service, has so far attracted over 30,000 customers, Zain Jordan said Saturday expecting the number to grow exponentially before the end of the year.
Zain, which introduced the service late January, expects the number of users will continue to grow as the company will soon launch more mobile-technology-based local and international services.
“Currently, we are in the process of launching international top-up from Jordan to abroad andvice versa which will allow expats living in Jordan and Jordanian immigrants living abroad to recharge talk time for their families in their home countries regardless of the network operator they are using,” Mona Qaddoumi, commerce manager at Zain Jordan, said Saturday.
“We will alsobe soon launching payment to merchants using Zain locally branded cards which are directly connected to the customers’ wallet,” Qaddoumi told The Jordan Times Saturday.
According to figures by Zain, the service has attracted 4,683 individual users and a total of 28,000 microfinance customers. Mobile penetration in Jordan exceeded 108 per cent, according to latest official figures.
The service, called “E-mal”, currently enables its users to make money transfers to individuals across the Kingdom by sending an SMS with a certain amount of money to another Zain subscriber who eventually can cash it out from any of Zain’s over 12,000 dealers and sub-dealers across Jordan.
The service, enabled through any type of mobile device, enables its users to top up their balance at the current stage as well.
Utility and government bill payments will also be available for Zain E-mal subscribers, she said.
In addition, Zain E-mal will allow customers to manage their bank accounts from their hand sets, she added.