Pezesha’s name comes from the two acronyms Pesa and Wezesha to mean Capital Enabler in Swahili. We are all about Africans empowering other Africans. We provide a holistic trusted financial crowdfunding infrastructure that connects investors to quality MSMEs.

Anyone who lends their money to Pezesha for onlending to borrowers qualified by Pezesha. Pezesha is a trusted intermediary who ensures risk mitigation for lenders or investors on the platform. To learn more on how to be a lender please visit https://pezesha.com/investor.

• Direct Integration with Supply Chain partners: We are directly plugged into the merchant partner database where we can see every level of transactional data of the borrower and partner network to enable embedded finance that drives productive lending
  
• Risk Minimization: Pezesha has deployed a robust proprietary credit scoring infrastructure (https://www.patascore.com/home), capable of processing conventional and unconventional wider data sets in order to identify credible underserved borrowers. The ability to identify these credible borrowers helps to minimize the risk that investors on our platform stand to face.
  

• Solid returns of targeted 10%-15% per year APR, compared to money market options of 3-7% APR.
  
• Ability to choose your portfolio structure and preference based on your risk appetite
  
• Be part of a movement creating social and economic impact
  

Mary is part of a merchant network and needs Ksh. 5,000 ($50) to buy weekly stock for her small kiosk in a low income neighbourhood in Nairobi. She does not have the cash available to buy her products and therefore has to temporarily close her business, although she knows would have Ksh. 10,000 in a month’s time from her revenues.

Through our mobile platform, Mary requests a loan from Pezesha, who conducts an automated credit score in 30 seconds with transaction data obtained from her merchant partner, and then sources the amount from capital.

Through Pezesha’s matching algorithms, Mary is then automatically matched with multiple investors to fund her working capital needs in a matter of minutes.

Mary can then grow her business, and improve her credit rating, paying back with mobile money.

For institutions please complete the form at the bottom of our institutions page.

Not always. When we have more supply of investors than we require, we reserve the right to stop the acceptance of new investors into our platform for a period of time. In such a case, we will notify new investors when we have the necessary demand again.

There are two main risks

1. Credit risk: This is the risk that a borrower defaults on a loan, we have managed this by:

• Pre-screening: Before on-boarding a borrower, we conduct thorough checks to determine their capacity to pay. Using our credit-scoring model (https://www.patascore.com) , we establish the borrower’s credit score and reference third party information from Credit Reference Bureaus. We also ensure the credit we lend is only used solely for business-purposes
  
• Diversification: We put your eggs in many baskets! The Pezesha platform spreads your risk by lending your funds across multiple borrowers.
  
• Prudent collection methods: through automated SMS reminders to customers before and when they are due including having call touchpoints through our in house customer care team to remind them to make their payments.
  

2. Operational risk: This is the risk that Pezesha as a company ceases to exist as a going concern. Please note that we are regulated by the Capital Markets Authority and are obliged to report our going concern to the authorities

Pezesha uses a number of processes to ensure that we approve borrowers who are likely to repay their loans. This creditworthiness evaluation is done in real time by the following means:

• CRB (Credit Bureau) previous credit history to know in seconds whether a borrower has failed to repay previous loans to any other Kenyan financial institutions in the past
  
• Verified and robust data that we access directly from mobile operators’ APIs with borrowers’ consent (for example their mobile money statements). This data enables us to get a very detailed view of their incomings and outgoings, which in turn allows us to determine whether a borrower has the financial capacity to repay your loan.
  
• Strategic partners/trustees provide us with 12 months of consistent stock and automated business transactions of the micro business they work with.
  
• Over time with initial repayment data we are also able to predict their long term repayment behaviour through our machine learning algorithms
  
• Our customer KYC process is thorough, including checks and balances such as checking with third party credit databases for any fraud or illegal track record.
  

Consumer protection is at the heart of our business for both our borrowers and lenders/investors. With the expertise of our legal arm, we have been able to set clear terms and conditions for our customers including complying with the best international practices over and above that which is required by Kenyan laws. We take a collaborative approach in educating our customers on our terms of use and ensuring good user experience in presenting and communicating the terms on our platform.We do this through 2 primary methods: Education and Borrower profiling.

1.Education

We understand that the character of a borrower is a key factor in whether they will meet his/her loan obligation. To this end, we spend considerable time in educating the borrower as a means of positively influencing their character.

Our loan process starts with education and creating self-financial awareness to the low income borrowers. This is followed by a clear explanation of the terms and conditions of the loan, in a language that is conversant to the borrower, and information on how the ability of the borrower to diligently abide by these terms helps them to improve their credit history performance, and to ultimately connect them to the formal financial system.

Additionally, this education helps us to build a loyal relationship with our customers and understand their needs better. The credit we facilitate is built on responsible financing - transparency and trust to the investors by giving them sufficient information about the borrowers’ risk profiles and use of funds.

We have closely followed guidelines by FSD Kenya on how to ensure high levels of consumer protection in what we do.

Importantly, time is taken to explain to the borrowers what the Credit Reference Bureau (CRB) is, and to introduce them to the concept and consequences of “blacklisting”.

In summary, we ensure that the borrowers understand the terms of the loan agreement before proceeding to the loan application process. This includes understanding:

• the foreseeability of harm or consequences including blacklisting if they fail to repay the loan on time;
  
• the use of the loan in line with moral and ethical principles
  
• the extent of the burden and consequences if the other members in their group or community do not pay back on time.
  
• the cost, availability and risks involved.
  

2. Borrower profiling:

Importantly, our goal is to be sustainable in the long term, and we know that this will only be possible by ensuring that the majority of our borrowers have the capacity to pay back the micro loans they are given.

Our profiling helps us to understand the borrowers better and as such, we take guardianship seriously, and are careful not to overextend the amount of credit to an individual until the borrower has proven that they have the ability to generate the necessary payments and thus not fall into a debt trap.

This is governed by our duty of care that involves the signing of a le

Our credit scoring evolves continuously. It increasingly grows in robustness for the purposes of intelligently assessing creditworthy borrowers and automatically rejecting the ones below the threshold. This significantly reduces default risk and increases returns for investors.

Our credit scoring model helps us to identify borrowers at risk of overextending their debt by spotting irregular patterns in the data obtained from them. This is done through complex data analytics which takes into context the Kenyan financial environment, and this is a core tenant of our credit scoring model.

Our exceptionally talented team has built successful credit scoring models in Africa before. They have designed the scoring system to scale with our growth and allow us to closely monitor the performance of our loans. This allows us to better assess our new borrowers in order to tailor our offering to them, and to allow investors to choose a risk portfolio which best suits them.

Yes. Our investment strengthens our “skin in the game” in understanding and learning from our own data, risks and consumer behaviour, as well as patterns to reduce the risk of bad debts.

Pezesha will continue to invest alongside other investors on the platform as this also helps us to maximize our returns in the short and long term. We walk the talk: Pezesha invests its own money on the platform to also demonstrate our confidence in our credit scoring model and also to gauge borrower behavior in terms of repayment and default so as to further enhance our credit scoring model.

We have implemented an effective recovery policy. We make the best effort to recover investors’ investment.We send frequent SMS reminders and calls to borrowers on their loan repayment schedule - from day 1 to day 30. If they are late, we send them automated follow up SMS reminders. Furthermore, we work closely with community champions to assist in the collection process. We then do a follow up call and SMS 30 days in advance before a borrower defaults on their repayment and before we blacklist in CRBs.

We ensure the external collection agency practices align with our values, approach and reporting policies through our monthly reviews and weekly communication and reporting. This is achieved through brainstorming cost effective and fair sanctions that include giving the borrowers choices of restructuring their debt while ensuring that they are not incentivized to restructure when they could otherwise repay on time. After day 120, we then write off the loan.

In the event that a repayment goes past its term, the borrower incurs reasonable daily flat charges to encourage them to quickly settle their balance. The penalty interest will be included in the investor’s return.

When funds are committed to a loan that has been disbursed, the money is with the borrower and cannot be reclaimed until it is repaid. When the borrower begins making repayments, these earnings are transferred back to your Pezesha account. Once the funds are in your Pezesha account, you can withdraw the funds at your convenience though we encourage you to re-invest to maximize your long-term returns.

With continuous loaning, if a borrower repays part of a loan then this repayment is automatically immediately reinvested into another loan to another borrower based on your risk preferences and appetite.

With loaning on full repayment, we only reinvest your return once the full repayment has been made by the borrower based on your risk preferences and appetite.

Your wallet balance is the amount which is available for withdrawal at any point in time.

The funding balance is the amount which can be utilized for granting out loans. Typically, both lending balance and funding balance show the same figure for investors who loan continuously from both interest earned and principal repaid.

These two balances will only be different if an investor chooses to lend on full repayment. In this case, the funding balance will be lesser than the wallet balance.

Under “all loans” in the menu tab, you can see the repayment status and amount paid, and balance for each loan at any given time. You will also be able to download all your loans performance and analyse for yourself at any given time.

Yes. Returns/Revenues that you earn on Pezesha will be considered part of your taxable income in accordance to Kenyan law. Foreigners will also be required to pay taxes. As from the month of June 2017, Pezesha started deducting 15% Withholding Tax for all interest earned by investors on our platform in accordance with Kenya law. This includes all interest on penalties accrued from late borrowers. This is a mandatory requirement by law under paragraph 5 of the third schedule of the income Tax Act. Lenders Wallet balance will be less WHT deductions. You can now see all the WHT from your dashboard on the app and when you click on it you will see the fine details of all loans and their deductions accordingly. Kindly note that we will be issuing you the Withholding Tax Certificate at the end of the year. That said, we are always flexible to issue it upon request by a lender/investor. In case of any further queries on tax contact us at lenders@pezesha.com

Pezesha is owned and run by a mix of African investors (as the majority investors) and international investors (as the minority investors) who have 10+ years of experience in the credit and business sector. The Pezesha Team is made up of local individuals and local lenders/investors whose aim is to empower other fellow Kenyans, ensuring equal opportunities and financial inclusion for all Kenyans.

Yes. Please send us any questions or enquiries that you may have to lenders@pezesha.com and we will respond to you as soon as possible.

Yes, as a foreign investor you have two options to lend on Pezesha platform. Either as a return-based lender or as a philanthropic lender. The process is a bit different compared to the way we on board local lenders. The terms remain the same as we currently have with our local lenders as stated here in the FAQs but the process of topping up your Pezesha wallet is different. You will be required to first review and sign off our lender terms and conditions agreement which we will send to you upon request. Then we will provide our bank details information for your lending amount disbursement. Then once we as Pezesha receive your funds, we will load them to your wallet less taxes or any charges incurred during the transfer and after creating your account the funds will be topped up to your Pezesha wallet and reflect real-time. Then from there you will be able to have full transparency that we have topped up all your funds, the borrowers you have lent to in line with your preferred portfolio preference setting, their personal details and also their repayment progress from a month to month basis. If you will need more information and reporting, we will always be at your disposal. Learn more here https://pezesha.com/foreigninvestor

Closing your account is as simple as turning it OFF in the lender setting option. This means that as an investor you shall not be lending out your funds however due to the nature of the business, when borrowers make payments they shall reflect in your wallet and you should be able to withdraw the funds into your account. We do not DELETE accounts as we need to keep them for future reference so for now you will need to turn it OFF in order to stop any lending from your account.

Yes, you can create both a lender and borrower account on Pezesha platform. Go back to login page, at the bottom choose the account type to create

Please write to lenders@pezesha.com and we shall be able to make the changes on our end as we do this from our end following various checks in order to reduce any fraud cases for our lenders/investors on the platform.

CREDIT SCORING SYSTEM: Firstly our credit scoring platform ensures that we are able to select the best borrowers in the market ensuring that even though borrowers are late on payments, they will eventually pay all amounts that they have been issued. We look at over 10,000 data points in deciding whether or not to provide a loan to a borrower.

Our credit scoring model (https://www.patascore.com) has gone through 7 iterations and we have seen tremendous improvements over the years and our PAR is lower than 10% compared to the average 30% default rate in the market.

CREDIT OPERATIONS TEAM: Additionally, we have an in house credit operations team that is responsible for borrower communication and collection. They are tasked with engaging with late borrowers every day and setting up a payment plan, which lowers the Portfolio At Risk for the business.

In fact as a business, we communicate with borrowers before their loans are due so that borrowers make partial payments which would increase the PAR exposure.

We are here for the long haul so our goal is to ensure a win-win for all parties involved.

PARTNERSHIP WITH EXTERNAL PARTNERS We also work with our external debt collection partner so as to ensure that borrowers are being contacted with different parties thereby increasing the likelihood that they pay.

Our external debt collection partners work to the highest of standards and this ensures that borrower conversion is optimized on a month on month basis.

FINANCIAL EDUCATION Finally, we also carry out borrower education before loans are issued. This way borrowers understand the importance of paying loans as the goal is for the borrower to climb up the financial ladder and eventually become investors, thereby empowering other borrowers in the process in the end building their financial health and wealth.

For now, we do not offer this option, but you can set your risk profile and preference which is what we obey when lending, then we diversify with our matching algorithm to do the work for you. We plan to introduce this functionality as part of our crowdfunding roadmap

We are currently one of the leading Fintech in Kenya approved under the Capital Markets Authority of Kenya Sandbox, this ensures our platform is tested, proven and ensures risk mitigation for lenders/investors on the platform at the same time consumer protection. Read more here. Our goal with the regulator is to be transparent, proactive and engage them at all times to ensure we are doing business in accordance with Kenyan law as advised by our capable legal team at all times in the end working with the required laws as they may fit over time.

• Wallet balance: means money you have available for lending to qualified SMEs when we match them to your settings as long as your lending is turned ON in the "lender setting". Now you have Kshs 122 which is very low to fund more loans, we encourage you to keep your lending ON so that you recycle your funds to compound your returns.
  
• Deposited: is what you deposited in your Pezesha wallet as your initial top up. We encourage you to top up more at least Kshs 20,000 minimum to increase your returns by diversifying to as many sme segments as possible.
  
• Amount due: Is what you have lent out plus interest earned when your loans mature and paid off. Check "all loans" on the menu to see when your loans are due.
  
• Revenue earned: is the interest return you get from lending your principal amount and loans assigned to you. Interest varies depending on loan amount and risk profile. Check "all loans" to confirm how much you are to be repaid for each loan.
  
• lent out is the total you have funded including the recycled interest revenue earned.
  
• Withholding tax amount withheld by us according to law 15% upon earning an interest on a repaid loan. We file WHT annually hence we request for you tax pin