Humble Beginnings – PayHere

Sri Lankans are an innovative populace. Day by day, they find a solution to a problem encountered on their way towards reaching a certain goal. Since the ¨open economy¨ policy was implemented in 1977, international trade boomed and the opportunity to export goods and services saved people from being poverty-stricken. Along with trade, services related to trade also saw a rise. Fast forward to the 2000s; with the adoption of the internet for businesses, the businessmen found ease in reaching customers and specific demographic niches beyond borders. With the diffusion of eCommerce overtime, Sri Lankan businesses found their way around to match the competition by changing business models from traditional physical stores to online/ eCommerce shopping platforms. An entirely new ecosystem was created around the emergence of this new business model with backward integration services and forward integration services.

With the smartphone usage increasing, the mobile space looked quite lucrative and several Sri Lankan companies innovated by providing a la carte services through mobile applications for phones and tabs. The supply side started performing better with supply chain management technologies and delivery side expediting with door-step delivery, paved the way for businesses to rethink how the payment landscape should change to aid the customers with ease of access to paying for their wants.

Sri Lanka does not have a national payment platform to support the vision of Sri Lankan businesses in becoming trade giants, locally and globally. To overcome this challenge, the business populace resort to international payment solutions like PayPal. They had anticipated its arrival only to have nothing but an unfulfilled void. Many looked for existing solutions to get their payments in an instant, but hardly took an entrepreneurial drive to seek for a novel manoeuvre.

For the luck of Sri Lankan businessmen, entrepreneurs, freelancers and government, an entrepreneur decided to come out of this abyss with his ¨technological virtuoso¨ personality. With a team of equal talent and skill, a payment service provider with an internationally recognized business model was born. The payment ecosystem had a new member in the name of PayHere, coming in as a payment aggregator to revolutionize the way people paid; whether it is the Sri Lankan Rupee, United States Dollar, Great Britain Pound, Euro or Australian Dollar.

While banks offer a similar service through banks’ internet payment gateways, the service only supported Visa and MasterCard for most banks while American Express and other international premium card brands like Diners Club and Discover International had to be obtained from another bank/banks. Then came the alternative payment business models like ezCash, mCash, Genie App, FriMi App and the internet banking and e-wallet app services like Sampath Wishwa. While the financial infrastructure improved and the ecosystem grew, the cost of supporting all these payment methods for a single business was exorbitant in pecuniary terms, and consuming in terms of time and sweat.

PayHere put all of them in one!

Simply put PayHere put its aggregator model into work. Merchants only have to contact PayHere to get the service of all of the above payment methods. PayHere has done the legwork for merchants by getting popular and convenient services on board. The revolution of eCommerce could now go in full swing. This was the resurrection of the open economy…till the regulators put a hold on operations.

We innovated.

PayHere faced the challenge of having and not having regulations for the novel business model it had adopted. While the global regulatory frameworks had adapted to support the new business models that came into being with the dynamic technological surroundings, local regulations pushed back PayHere to restructure and comply with a new law.

So we did.

That’s how PayHere became the first and only non-bank Payment Service Provider (PSP) to abide by the Payments and Settlements Direction No.01 of 2018 of the Central Bank of Sri Lanka and provide secured services with the support of Sampath Bank of Sri Lanka.

PayHere is here to stay; but how did PayHere come all this way?

Merchants. Merchants. Merchants. 1600+ merchants have joined hands with PayHere, trusting the affordable truly Sri Lankan service and we are forever thankful for them. To bring convenience to the seekers of payment gateways to quickly come on board, PayHere has automated the application process and the user base is now all over the country. Diversity of our merchants shows that PayHere is for all; be it SMEs, Medium and Large businesses.

PayHere. Stay There.

Relax. Enjoy. Live. You don’s have to come looking for us to start using PayHere. It’s a ¨quick try¨ and ¨quick application¨ on payhere.lk with self-learning options as well. PayHere also has the human element to support the merchants through 0113009975 and it is not limited to office hours. The customer service has been automated to answer many queries of many stakeholders. Enthusiasts from all around the country and indeed, the world are mostly welcome to visit our office on the west side of the country, close to the beaches: at No. 46, Galle Road, Kalutara, Sri Lanka.

You are welcome!