PayFort, a leading online payment service provider in the region, has launched a new card-on-delivery service to allow merchants to offer card-on-delivery payments for their purchases.

The new card-on-delivery service will first be piloted with Souq.com, the largest online retail and marketplace platform in the Middle East, in the UAE before being rolled out to other countries across the region. PayFort will make the card-on-delivery service available to other merchants across the region at a later date.

“We are pleased to be able to continue innovating and delivering new services to the Arab world, allowing merchants across the region to make more and more payment options available to their customers,” said Omar Soudodi, managing director of PayFort.

“Piloting our latest new service via Souq.com, we’re proud to provide online shoppers with the facility to pay on delivery using a credit or debit card.”

"We’re excited about the introduction of the new card-on-delivery payment service and I know that our customers will be too," said Souq.com CEO and co-founder Ronaldo Mouchawar. "Card-on-delivery means that payment-on-delivery customers will now have a choice of paying by cash or by card. Our delivery agents will be able to process all major credit and debit cards using a mobile card machine.”

According to State of Payments 2016, about 50 per cent of consumers in the Arab world prefer to pay in cash and cash-on-delivery (COD) customers remain a significant segment of the Middle East’s ecommerce market.

However, the percentage of card purchases is growing and many experienced online shoppers now prefer to use credit cards. PayFort and Souq.com believe that the new card-on-delivery service is another initiative that will help build trust in ecommerce and card payments amongst today’s COD customers.

The volume of online payments made in the Arab world could reach more than $69 billion of transactions per annum by the year 2020. According to State of Payments, the region is seeing increased growth in consumer acceptance to pay online. Saudi Arabia and the UAE lead the region in online payments. – TradeArabia News Service