Dashen Unveils Fuel Payment Service via Super App, Becomes Latest Bank in Digital Shift

Dashen Bank has become the latest financial institution to join the digital fuel payment ecosystem through a new service integrated into its super app. The Bank unveiled its latest digital product at a ceremony held at the Sheraton Addis Hotel late Monday afternoon. Dashen became the third financial institution to announce integration into the national fuel aggregator portal in the past three weeks, preceded by Oromia International Bank's Milkii and Safaricom’s MPESA mobile money service.

Dashen’s latest service allows customers to scan QR codes and process fuel payments, leveraging codes generated through the national fuel aggregator. Through a dashboard accessible on the super app and communication with fuel station attendants, the service looks to facilitate payments in three simple steps, according to Lidya Bezabih, Director of Digital Banking at Dashen.

Dashen launched its super app three months ago and has bolstered it with a series of mini-app integrations. Airlines tickets, DSTV payments, utility payments, and an e-commerce portal targeting the holiday rush were amongst the introductions until the fuel payment system.

Ethiopia’s government has been attempting to attain end-to-end digitization across the fuel supply chain for the past two years with mixed success. While the value of digital payments has surpassed 400 billion Birr, strict implementation outside of major cities has remained relatively limited. Speaking to Shega last week, Berho Hassen, state minister for transport and logistics, underscored the importance of ensuring that each liter of fuel in the country is sold in a digital format. He reiterated similar remarks during Dashen’s digital fuel payment launch and called for financial technology firms to join the fold.

“Even though our strategy is focused on green mobility, we don’t want fuel payments to be made in cash,” the state minister said.

Closing the window for black market operations, increasing efficiency and enhanced supervision of the little over 1,800 fuel stations in the country have been cited as key benefits. 

Ethiopia’s digital fuel payment initiative has been primarily dominated by the mobile money services of EthioTelecom’s telebirr for the past two years. The formerly fully state-owned operator facilitated over 233-billion-birr worth of transactions in the 2023/2024 financial year.  While Cooperative Bank of Ethiopia, the Commercial Bank of Ethiopia, and followed suite transaction volumes have not caught up with the telecom service provider. Dashen, which managed to generate 4.88 billion birr in net profits in the last fiscal year, will leverage its national reach to compete in this digital fuel payment landscape.