By Lilian Museka
Nairobi, Kenya : After completing his Strategic Management Masters Degree course at the Kenya Methodist University (Kemu) in 2011, Mr. Abdul Aziz Omar applied for a government job and made it to the 30 shortlisted to attend the interview.
He waited for interview dates and three months down the line, he received no communication. It is only through his trip to the local post office that he realized his appointment letter had been sent through the postal address.
Abdul, now Chief Executive Officer (CEO) at M-Post sadly lost the job as the letter had indicated that if they didn’t hear from him in a week’s time; it would be assumed he was not interested.
“It is through this disappointment that led us to co-found M-Post,” Says Mr. Twahir Mohammed, a Bachelors of Science degree in information Technology holder, a Co-founder and Chief Technology Officer (CTO), with whom they schooled together at Sheikh Khalifa Secondary School in Mombasa.
M-Post is a service that turns mobile phones into formal postal addresses. Its abbreviation meaning Mobile Post enables any mobile phone user to have his or her phone act like a mobile post office, thereby getting access to postal services through the mobile phone.
The two partnered with Postal Corporation of Kenya, commonly referred to as Posta. “The convenience aspect of it is what made Posta to agree to partner with us. They gave us an opportunity to launch a pilot project and within six months, we had 200 subscribers. The product was officially launched in the market in 2016,” says Twahir.
Today M-Post has 43,000 subscribers countrywide and has so far done over 30,000 deliveries across the world.
But how does M-post work? “A user can either register through the website registration portal or through the USSD code *890*90# which caters for people without smart phones, follow the steps to register. A user will then choose the most convenient post office out of the 600 post offices in Kenya where they can receive their documents. Once a letter is received by Posta, an SMS will be sent to the user notifying him of the mail. The user can then either choose to collect it from the Post offices or have it delivered to their location at an extra fee after confirmation of ownership through an Identity Card and the SMS alert,’ says Twahir.
Image of M-Post / Courtesy M-Post
The virtual post address costs a user Ksh 300 annually to own one unlike the physical Box which costs Ksh. 2,300 per year. Twahir adds that People with physical addresses can also connect them to their phone numbers and still access the services as subscription revenue is shared between Posta and M-Post.
Postal Corporation of Kenya is one of the oldest institutions in the country that dates back to the 17th century and established as PCK by an Act of Parliament (PCK Act 1998). However, rapid technological advancements and a liberalized marked may threaten its survival.
In the 2019 paper of Kenya’s Digital Economy Blue Print, the government admits that the country faces a future of immense possibilities with the growing digital world. The paper calls on all institutions to adapt to the new reality of technology becoming a cornerstone of daily activities.
By Posta partnering with M-post, Twahir says the move has given the service leverage in the current competitive market.
M-post also offers the Pick and Drop service which enables one to dispatch mails or parcels through mobile phones. Twahir says one only needs to dial the short code *890*90# from their mobile phone, enter pick up location and the drop location. The mail or parcel is then delivered at the agreed point. Some of the parcels delivered through this format include parcels and documents, cheques pickups and banking, business and personal errands, flowers, cakes and gift hampers.
“We have our own riders and sometimes partner with Posta to use their own. Our charges range from 175 cents within a kilometer and Ksh 20 for every extra kilometer. The descriptive nature of technology helps us in calculating the distance and amount to be charge,” he says
M-Post, also known as Posta Mkononi has a variety of advantages which include convenience, where the user receives alerts, affordability, where it only costs Ksh 300 annually which users pay via Mpesa and security as it ensures privacy of users’ mails.
M-post is spreading to other regions, having done the implementation stage in Uganda and currently training the posta staff, they seek to scale up in East African markets, West Africa, South Africa and South East Asia, where there is a large concentration of developing countries.
Operating under the Company name Taz technologies, M-Post has also partnered with Ajira Digital Platform, a government led multi-sectoral initiative that aims at connecting young people to online work. Taz initiated Pata Ajira na M-Postwhere individuals get paid agent fees for enrolling people on M-Post with an aim of enhancing virtual posts among all population.
“We launched the initiative in 2017and so far we have 3,800 registered pata Ajira na M-post agents across the country, says Twahir, adding that, “any person can become an agent by registering at www.ajira.go.ke and follow the process therein. For every customer one successfully enrolls to M-Post, he receives Ksh. 50 in his Mpesa account. During registration, the customer is asked to enter the phone number of the person who referred him to M-Post and the number entered in that field receives a Ksh. 50 commission”
Twahir also explains that one can become a super agent by hitting 200 registrations in a month and maintaining the same for every other month to maintain the super agent status. He then receives a higher commission of Ksh 65 per successful sign up with extra Ksh. 15 upon confirmation of the target.
This he says is one way of eradicating unemployment among the youth who are their specific target in the project.
Twahir however says that despite the heights in innovations, they still face challenges like the need to keep training Posta staff spread all over on how to implement the M-post service. This he says is very expensive in terms of logistics. He adds that there is need for the government to devolve innovation where county directors of ICT take up the role of implementation and training.
“There is need for counties to push for the introduction of ICT hubs in every region to ensure proper implementation of technology in every region,’ he adds.
In their quest to scale to other countries, the two innovators got a go ahead from the Universal Postal Union (UPU) to roll out the M-Post service in 144 countries. UPU is the United Nations specialized agency for the postal sector.
Since its launch, M-post has worn several awards including the Oracle innovation Award on social equity and youth empowerment which saw their product Pata Ajira nominated in 2016. Others include The African Union Public Service award of 2017 which they shared with Posta, and 2019 African Startup World champion held in San Francisco early this year
