• TymeBank has announced that it has amassed 8 million customers since launch in February 2019.
• The digital-only bank says one in five eligible South Africans now has an account.
• It has also diversified in launching TymeHealth and expanding into the Philippines.

TymeBank, which bills itself as a digital-only financial institution, has announced a significant milestone as it has amassed 8 million customers since it first launched to the public in February of 2019.

It says that this makes it one of the world’s fastest growing digital banks, with the 8 million figure accurate as of 6th October.

The digital institution also highlighted the fact that one in five eligible South Africans has a TymeBank account, with eligible in this case being anyone over the age of 16, which is one of the requirements for opening up a bank account with the company.

Throwing up some more numbers, TymeBank estimates that its monthly growth sits at around 200 000 new accounts each month, and after recently launching a similar service in the Philippines in 2021, it is seeing the same kind of growth in that region.

It adds that it has also seen a 70 percent account activity rate on a rolling 30-day basis, which means a large number of those 8 million accounts are being used regularly.

“We are immensely proud of the fact that we have acquired eight million customers since launching in February 2019. Our performance reinforces our position as one of the world’s fastest growing digital banks and a credible alternative to the legacy banks for South Africans. This pace of growth also brings us closer to our ambition of becoming one of the top three retail banks in the country,” enthused TymeBank CEO Coen Jonker.

“What is particularly pleasing is the fact that the last million customers were acquired in record time – just under five months, despite ongoing challenges,” he added in a press release sent to Hypertext.

As for some of the challenges that it has had to overcome, TymeBank points to ongoing outages at Home Affairs has proved a hinderance when it comes to verifying customers’ identities during onboarding. Loadshedding has expectedly had an impact too, and while TymeBank kiosks have battery backup, the blackouts affect the operation of stores and shopping centres where said kiosks are located.

Despite these challenges, recent developments in the fintech space have yielded results, with the rollout of PayShap in particular being highlighted.

“Since launching PayShap in August as the only bank to allow payments to mobile numbers linked to any bank account for free, TymeBank has seen a steady increase in the usage of this real-time payment service. The bank’s fixed deposit product – launched earlier this year and offering South Africa’s best savings rates (11%) – has also been a huge success,” it pointed out.

As for what the coming months and years hold, we should see TymeBank branch out into other industries associated with finance and banking, with the institution having already acquired Retail Capital in order to facilitate SME funding, as well as launching TymeHealth as its medical insurance offering locally.