JamboPay, an online payment solution that facilitates payments through mobile phone over the internet, has partnered with the county government of Nairobi to enhance parking fees collection using drones.
The online payment gateway wants to introduce aerial drones to ensure that motorists pay for parking in Nairobi.
This comes barely a year after the Kenya Civil Aviation Authority (KCAA) approved the use of drones, also known as Aerial Unmanned Vehicles (AUVs), in Kenya.
In case you have been among those dodging the Ksh. 300 parking fees, your days are numbered since it will not be easy to default payment with the aerial imagery data gathering module.
The objective is to increase the collection of parking fees and cut losses that have been reported over the years.
Web Tribe Company, a firm charged with the automation of 14 county revenue streams, is set to take charge of the drones on behalf of the Nairobi county government.
Web Tribe CEO Danson Muchemi said that the new move will be used to determine the number of cars in various parking slots and cross-check this data against the day’s cash collection.
He added that the drones will fly across parking areas twice a day within the city. The objective will be to capture and relay data to Web Tribe servers.
The information collection will then be relayed to the County Parking Department, which will, in turn, take appropriate measures including clamping of vehicles.
JamboPay writes to Kenya Civil Aviation Authority
JamboPay has already made a request to KCCA seeking permission to import and operate commercial drones that will enhance revenue collection.
Part of the letter read, in part, “Part of our mandate for the Nairobi City County is the enhancement of revenue collection through provision of timely and accurate compliance data. We have developed an aerial imagery compliance data-gathering module that will require us to deploy a drone to collect parking compliance data”
“We hereby request your approval of importation and operation of the two commercial drones” it added.
Related: Visa Partners with Jambo Pay to Increase mVisa Payments
The Big Shift
Recently the newly-elected Nairobi Governor Mike Sonko stated that cash payments will no longer apply at City Hall since all revenue streams would be automated.
Sonko says that cash payments have facilitated corruption and this has, in turn, led to the loss of revenue.
He said that his government will make it mandatory for people to make payments through the ejijiPay service. This can be done by visiting epayments.nairobi.go.ke, making payments by dial *217# on your phone, or via ejijiPay app.
At present, only a handful of revenue streams are automated while a majority of them are manual.
Since taking office, Sonko has taken a keen interest in sealing loopholes that lead to loss of revenue. The efforts have led to an increase in daily revenue collection with the highest hitting a record Ksh. 38 million.
A team appointed to investigate fraud visited JamboPay offices to understand the flow of county revenue and they discovered massive fraud. They stated that millions of shillings were being pocketed by individuals daily.
We hereby request your approval of importation and operation of the two commercial drones
