Tigo Rwanda has launched ‘Tira Tigo’, a new product that allows prepaid customers to borrow airtime from Tigo and pay back later.

According to company officials, the company continues to target the largest segment of Rwanda’s telecom market by introducing more innovative products.

"This new product is for our prepaid subscribers who top up airtime at their own will. It can be frustrating for any prepaid client to run out of airtime when one needs to call,” Nina Ndabaneze, the Marketing Manager told Business Times.
”Therefore we continue to be innovative by introducing a means through which one can borrow airtime when one is out of credit then pay back later,” she added.

Officials also added that basically all Tigo prepaid customers who are active for at least three months and have a balance between Rwf 0 and Rwf 3 are eligible to use this product.

To use the product once, a client dials *444#. An automatic amount would be loaded to the client’s account if he or she met the eligibility criteria. Officials also explained that the maximum amount that can be borrowed is Rwf 80 and the customer repays Rwf 80 with a small service fee of Rwf 10.

According to the Rwanda Utilities and Regulatory Agency (RURA), prepaid mobile subscribers constitute more than 80 percent of Rwanda’s telecom market which is shared by three players.

Recently RURA also announced that the company had surpassed Rwandatel as the second most subscribed mobile telecom company after attaining slightly more than 500,000 subscribers in just seven months of operation.

Officials attributed the achievement to the deployment of a robust GSM network, a very solid 3G network and an electronic airtime distribution system which made the Rwandan operation one of the most advanced in terms of mobile technology.

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