We provide reliable information about Kenya's mobile money services — guides, charges, calculators, and resources that help Kenyans make informed financial decisions every day.
Published by Index Digital Systems Limited, a Kenyan digital media and technology company.
Who Publishes This Site
mobilemoney.co.ke is owned and operated by Index Digital Systems Limited (IDS), a digital media and technology company registered in Kenya.
Index Digital Systems Limited Hilton Business Center, Ruiru Kamiti Road, Kenya Website: ids.co.ke Email: [INSERT PUBLIC EMAIL] LinkedIn: linkedin.com/company/index-digital-systems
IDS builds information platforms for Kenya across news, finance, sports, and everyday tools. Every platform we operate follows the same published editorial standards. You can read more about the company, its leadership, and its full portfolio at ids.co.ke.
Who Writes and Reviews This Content
Financial information should never be anonymous. Every guide, tariff table, and calculator on this site is produced or reviewed by a named member of the IDS editorial team, and every article carries a byline.
Peris Wanjiru — Finance Editor. A banking veteran with a BSc in Statistics, Peris leads financial content across IDS platforms and is responsible for the accuracy of tariff data, transaction limits, and fee calculations on this site.
Johnson Mwangi — Editor / Content Lead. A seasoned journalist who oversees editorial standards, writer supervision, and fact-checking across all IDS publications.
Christine Tatua — Operations & Data Manager. Brings a decade of experience in finance, compliance, and data analytics to the data systems behind our calculators.
Eric Tatua — Founder & CEO. A DevOps and cloud engineer with over 15 years building digital platforms in Kenya.
Morris Gituku — Head of Technology & Infrastructure. 25+ years in IT, network security, and cloud operations.
The full team, with credentials and contact links, is listed at ids.co.ke/team. If you have a question about a specific article or figure, you can reach the responsible editor through our contact page.
Important: This Is Information, Not Financial Advice
mobilemoney.co.ke provides general information only. We do not provide personalised financial, investment, tax, or legal advice, and nothing on this site should be treated as a recommendation to use, avoid, or transact through any particular service.
We are not a bank, a payment service provider, a licensed financial adviser, or a money remittance provider. We do not process payments, hold customer funds, or handle transactions of any kind. We will never ask you for your PIN, your ID number, an OTP, or access to your mobile money account — and neither will any legitimate provider.
Charges, limits, and terms change without notice. The figure displayed on your provider's confirmation screen before you enter your PIN is always the authoritative one. Verify time-critical figures directly with Safaricom, Airtel, or Telkom before you transact, and consult a qualified professional before making significant financial decisions.
If you believe you have been defrauded, contact your provider's official customer care line immediately and report the matter to the relevant authorities.
How We Source and Verify Information
Because the information on this site can affect real financial decisions, we hold it to a higher standard than general-interest content.
Primary sources first. Tariffs, limits, and product terms are taken from official published sources — Safaricom, Airtel Kenya, and Telkom Kenya tariff schedules and terms of service, and regulatory publications from the Central Bank of Kenya. We link to the source wherever one is publicly available.
Everything is dated. Every charges page and calculator displays the date it was last verified against the provider's published tariff. If you cannot see a date on a page, treat the figures as unverified and check with the provider.
Regular review. Tariff and limit pages are reviewed on a recurring schedule and updated promptly whenever a provider announces a change or a regulatory adjustment takes effect. Substantive changes are noted in a changelog on the relevant page.
Calculators are checked against published bands. Our fee calculators implement the providers' published tariff bands rather than estimating percentages. Where a fee depends on a choice made by a merchant or bank rather than the provider, we say so instead of guessing.
We say what we don't know. Where a provider does not publish a rate, or where sources conflict, we state that plainly rather than filling the gap.
Our full sourcing methodology is published at ids.co.ke/how-we-use-ai-and-sources.
Corrections
We make mistakes, and we would rather hear about them than leave them up.
If you find an incorrect charge, an outdated limit, a broken procedure, or a Paybill number that no longer works, please report it through our corrections page. We investigate every report. Where we have published something materially wrong, we correct it and note the correction on the page rather than quietly editing it away.
Editorial Independence and How We Make Money
mobilemoney.co.ke is funded by advertising. We display ads served by third-party advertising networks, including Google AdSense. Third-party vendors, including Google, use cookies to serve ads based on a user's prior visits to this and other websites. You can opt out of personalised advertising through Google Ads Settings, and you can find full detail on what we collect in our privacy policy.
Advertisers have no influence over our content. No advertiser, sponsor, or commercial partner reviews, approves, or shapes our guides, tariff tables, or comparisons before publication. Ad placement is automated and is never a factor in which provider we recommend, how we rank options, or what we say about fees.
We are not affiliated with any mobile money provider. We have no commercial relationship with Safaricom, Airtel Kenya, or Telkom Kenya. We are not authorised agents, resellers, or partners of any of them. All trademarks — M-Pesa, Airtel Money, T-Kash and others — belong to their respective owners and are used here for identification only.
Where any piece of content is sponsored, affiliate-linked, or otherwise commercially arranged, it is labelled clearly and prominently at the top of that page. If a page carries no such label, no money changed hands.
How We Use AI
We are open about how our content is made. IDS content combines original reporting and data analysis with AI-assisted writing and clearly-labelled summaries. AI is a drafting and research tool here — it does not publish unsupervised. Every page that carries financial figures is reviewed by a named human editor before publication and re-checked against the provider's published tariff on each update.
Our full policy is at ids.co.ke/how-we-use-ai-and-sources.
What We Cover
Our focus is deliberate. We cover the mobile money wallets operated by Kenya's mobile network operators: M-Pesa (Safaricom), Airtel Money (Airtel), and T-Kash (Telkom). These are the three services that let you hold and move money with nothing more than a SIM card and a phone number, no bank account required. They are what most Kenyans mean by "mobile money," and they are what we cover.
That focus is what lets us go deep. Rather than thinly summarising every payment product in the market, we maintain detailed, current, verified information on the three platforms that handle the overwhelming majority of everyday transactions in Kenya.
M-Pesa (Safaricom) — Kenya's largest mobile money service and the most deeply integrated into daily life. Our M-Pesa coverage is the most extensive on the site, reflecting its scale and the number of services built around it.
Airtel Money (Airtel) — Airtel's wallet, accessed by dialling *185# or through the Airtel Money app. Airtel has waived person-to-person transfer fees across all bands, which makes it meaningfully cheaper than M-Pesa for sending money in many situations.
T-Kash (Telkom) — Telkom's wallet, accessed via *160# or the SIM toolkit. T-Kash uses a one-time eight-digit code for agent and ATM withdrawals rather than agent numbers, a system different enough from its competitors to warrant its own guides.
We also cover the connections between the three, since cross-network transfers are now among the most common transactions in Kenya.
What Falls Outside Our Scope
We are asked about these regularly, so it is worth being clear about where our lines sit.
We do not treat bank-operated wallets and bank payment rails as mobile money in the sense this site uses the term. That includes KCB Vooma, Equitel, and PesaLink. These are real and useful services, but they are banking products reached through a phone rather than mobile network operator wallets, and they operate under different rules, fee structures, and supervision.
We also do not cover merchant payment gateways and aggregators such as Pesapal, Flutterwave, or IntaSend. Those are tools for businesses collecting payments, not consumer wallets.
Where these services touch the three wallets we cover — moving money from M-Pesa into a bank account, for instance — we document that connection, because our readers need it. What we do not do is present ourselves as a comprehensive guide to Kenyan banking or e-commerce payments.
What We Offer
Comprehensive Guides — Step-by-step instructions for M-Pesa, Airtel Money, and T-Kash, from basic transfers to advanced features like loans, savings, and bill payments.
Current Charges Information — Updated fee structures and transaction costs across all three providers, so you can work out what a transaction will cost before you confirm it.
Smart Calculators — Interactive tools that estimate transaction fees, check limits, and compare cross-network transfer costs.
Educational Resources — Articles explaining mobile money trends, regulatory changes, and safe usage in a fast-moving fintech landscape.
The Ecosystem
Mobile Money Powers Every Corner of Kenyan Life
Since M-Pesa's launch in 2007, mobile money has grown from a simple person-to-person transfer service into a financial ecosystem connecting individuals, businesses, banks, utility providers, and government. M-Pesa remains by far the largest of the three platforms, which is why much of the detail below concerns it — but Airtel Money and T-Kash offer parallel services, and we cover their equivalents throughout the site.
For Individuals
Personal Finance & Everyday Transactions
All three wallets let you manage money entirely from a phone: sending and receiving in real time, depositing and withdrawing at agent outlets and enabled ATMs, buying airtime and bundles, and transferring across networks to any Kenyan mobile money number.
Beyond basic transfers, M-Pesa has become a personal finance hub. Users can save through M-Shwari and KCB M-Pesa, access micro-loans, use Fuliza for overdrafts, invest through Ziidi money market funds, schedule recurring payments with M-Pesa Ratiba, and manage children's finances through M-Pesa GO. Airtel Money and T-Kash offer their own savings, credit, and bill-payment features, covered in their respective sections.
Account management tools across all three include balance enquiries, mini-statements, full transaction statements, and PIN management.
For Business
Merchants, Enterprises & Developers
M-Pesa offers tools for businesses of every size. The M-Pesa Business Till lets merchants collect payments through Buy Goods with higher limits and business-specific tools, while Pochi la Biashara gives micro-merchants a wallet that separates business and personal funds.
The M-Pesa for Business app lets owners track transactions, view statements, and pay suppliers or staff. Business credit products include Fuliza ya Biashara, M-Pesa Taasi Till Loan, and M-Pesa Taasi Pochi. For larger organisations, M-Pesa Bulk Payment (B2C) handles salaries and NGO disbursements in real time, and B2B transactions move money between businesses.
Developers can integrate payments using the M-Pesa Daraja APIs. Airtel Money and T-Kash also provide merchant collection and business payment services, and we document how these compare.
Payments & Bills
Utilities, Services & Bill Payments
Through Lipa na M-Pesa, users pay via two channels: Pay Bill for utility bills, school fees, taxes, and registered organisations, and Buy Goods (Till Number) for merchants like supermarkets, restaurants, and shops. Airtel Money and T-Kash support bill payments to most of the same billers.
We publish detailed guides for paying Kenya Power electricity (prepaid tokens and postpaid accounts), county water bills, internet and TV subscriptions, insurance premiums, school fees, hospital bills, and rent — noting where a biller can be paid from all three wallets rather than M-Pesa alone.
We also maintain a comprehensive Paybill directory covering hundreds of service providers, so you can find the right Paybill number and account format quickly. Paybill numbers change; always confirm with the organisation before sending money.
Government Services
Government & Public Sector
The Kenyan government has consolidated its payment services under the single Paybill number 222222. Through mobile money, citizens can pay KRA taxes (income tax, VAT, PAYE) using a PRN from iTax, settle eCitizen fees for passports, driving licences, business registration, and marriage certificates, and pay county revenue including land rates, single business permits, and parking fees.
Other government-linked services include SHA health insurance contributions (which replaced NHIF), NSSF payments, NTSA services, stamp duty through Ardhisasa, and Huduma Centre services. We provide step-by-step guides for each.
Banking & Global
Bank Links & International Transfers
Mobile money integrates with virtually every commercial bank in Kenya. Users move money between wallets and bank accounts using each bank's Paybill number — KCB (522522), Equity (247247), Co-operative Bank (400200), Standard Chartered (329329), NCBA (880100), Family Bank (222111), among others. Products like KCB M-Pesa and M-Shwari bring banking services to users without traditional bank accounts.
M-Pesa Global enables transfers to and from a wide range of countries, making it a major channel for diaspora remittances into Kenya. M-Pesa to PayPal allows linking a PayPal account for withdrawals and top-ups, and M-Pesa GlobalPay provides a virtual Visa card for international online payments. Airtel Money supports its own international transfer corridors, covered separately.
We document these bank and international connections as they relate to the three wallets. We do not cover banking products in their own right.
Our Mission
To Democratise Access to Mobile Money Information
Mobile money is nearly universal in Kenya, yet reliable information about charges, limits, and procedures remains surprisingly hard to find outside official channels. Many people still rely on word of mouth or outdated figures when making financial decisions. We exist to change that.
Independence — We maintain editorial independence from all mobile money providers and from our advertisers.
Accuracy — Every guide and calculator is researched against official sources, dated, and updated to reflect current policies and charges.
Accessibility — Complex financial information presented in clear, simple language, whatever your technical background.
Accountability — Named editors, published standards, and an open corrections process.
Verification First — We stress the importance of confirming every transaction detail before completing it. We provide reference information only.
Contact Us
Questions, corrections, and press enquiries are welcome.
- Corrections and factual errors: ids.co.ke/corrections
- General enquiries: ids.co.ke/contact
- Postal / physical: Index Digital Systems Limited, Hilton Business Center, Ruiru Kamiti Road, Kenya
Related policies: Editorial Standards · How We Use AI & Sources · Privacy Policy · Terms of Use
mobilemoney.co.ke is an independent information platform published by Index Digital Systems Limited. We are not affiliated with Safaricom, Airtel Kenya, Telkom Kenya, or any mobile money provider. We do not process payments. Information is provided for general reference only and does not constitute financial advice. Always verify charges and details with your provider before transacting.