One wonders what is the point of being a member of ECOWAS and UEMOA if we are not included in modern financial circuits?!
I'm angry! This article should have been posted online 2 years ago! Because for 2 years, I have had the same problem: thousands of euros in potential turnover are waiting for me, but I am unable to collect them in a simple way, on my website!
I'm trying, as best I can, to run a receptive tour agency. My 2022 turnover was around €15,000, which is nothing, regarding the potential, but that's not the worst!
I had to go out of my way to get my clients to pay for their stays in Guinea-Bissau!
Forget PayPal, Stripe and other Western platforms!
Africa... This red zone, place of residence of the worst fifty-year-old grazers, does not have the right to digital financial services and advantageous rates.
I tried PayPal, as soon as they discovered I was in Guinea-Bissau, they've blocked the funds arbitrarly for 3 freaking months...
Stripe? Because Tourism (or Africa?) is risky, one day they block 25% for 120 days, next day 10% for 180 days, the last one 50% for 30 days... I had cold sweats and treasury headaches each time someone purchased something in my website, so I stopped!
But what really breaks the heart is when you realize that even among the West African platforms, none include Guinea-Bissau... We share the same currency amongst 15 countries, the same French-monetary-colonial-system while being colonized by portuguese on top of it, but we're not allowed to TRY to get our economy to grow???
As of October 26, 2023, none of these platforms allows a Bissau-Guinean company to open an account and receive payments online.
What about local banks?
A company with a bank account should be able to benefit from an online payment service, right? It's a big NOPE that I want to shout out, but I must temper myself, because some banks have thought about it, some banks have launched the service in the past but without success... In short, I have to go back and see each of them ONE BY ONE in order to have definitive and actualized opinions. Lucky me, there's only 6 differents commercial banks!
To be continued...