Ozow Review

Ozow is a South African payments company, based in Cape Town, that started out in instant EFT ('pay by bank') and has since added cards, PayShap requests, bank-app payments, vouchers, crypto and buy now, pay later. It was founded in 2014 as i-Pay by Thomas Pays, Mitchan Adams and Lyle Eckstein, renamed Ozow in 2019, and raised a $48 million Series B led by Tencent in November 2021. As of October 2026 its published Standard package charges 1.5% (minimum R1.00) for pay by bank, Capitec Pay, Absa Pay, Nedbank Direct EFT, PayShap Request and crypto, 2.85% for local cards falling to 2.65% in higher bands, and 3.5% for international cards, with no setup or subscription fee. Payouts and refunds cost R3.00 each. Merchants sign with Ozow itself, which collects funds as their agent and settles them on a schedule: pay-by-bank money once a day, card money typically once a week. Ozow is registered with the Payments Association of South Africa as a system operator and as a third-party payment provider sponsored by seven banks. The weak points are service and stability. HelloPeter rates it 1 out of 5 and Ozow does not respond there. In April 2025 MyBroadband reported that its co-founder and CEO had been suspended amid a dispute with shareholders, and as of September 2026 the company is led by an interim CEO.

Estimated annual cost at three realistic processing volumes, using Ozow’s published online rate plus monthly fees. Real costs vary with average transaction size, chargeback rate, and any negotiated terms.

What Ozow is

Ozow is a South African payments company that made its name with instant EFT, which it now calls Pay by Bank. Instead of entering a card, the customer pays straight from their bank account and Ozow confirms the payment to the merchant in real time. Its homepage says it reaches 47 million bank account holders, has more than 6 million registered users, works with thousands of merchants and employs more than 150 people. These are the company's own undated figures. It has since added Visa and Mastercard card acceptance (announced in November 2024), PayShap requests, direct integrations with four banks' apps, voucher payments for people without a bank account, crypto payments, buy now, pay later, payouts and refunds. In September 2026 it described itself as an end-to-end payments and infrastructure partner rather than a pay-by-bank provider.

The company was founded in 2014 as i-Pay by Thomas Pays, Mitchan Adams and Lyle Eckstein, according to Ozow's own 2019 profile of Pays and a 2019 announcement from investor Kalon Venture Partners. It announced its rebrand to Ozow in April 2019. Its registered company, Ozow (Pty) Ltd, carries a 2013 registration number, so the legal entity is slightly older than the business. Ozow's PAIA manual gives its head office as The Box, 9 Lower Burg Street, Cape Town. Kalon Venture Partners backed the seed and 2019 Series A rounds. In November 2021 Ozow raised a $48 million Series B led by Tencent, which committed about $20 million, with Endeavor Catalyst and Endeavor Harvest Fund also investing. TechCrunch put the company's total funding at $51.7 million at that point. These are investors, and Ozow has not published who holds a controlling stake.

Why we list Ozow as a bank payment provider

Ozow's core product runs on bank rails, not card networks, and the merchant signs with Ozow itself. Ozow's published merchant terms appoint it as the merchant's agent for receiving payments, allowing it to collect, aggregate and hold the funds before settling them. Ozow is authorised by the Payments Association of South Africa (PASA) as a system operator, and PASA's July 2026 register lists it as a third-party payment provider sponsored by seven banks: Absa, Capitec, FirstRand, GoTyme, Investec, Nedbank and Standard Bank. Cards are a newer, secondary product. On the same register, Absa and Standard Bank sponsor Ozow for credit and debit cards, and the card side works much like a payment facilitator. Pay by bank is the default product and the reason most merchants choose Ozow, so we class it as a bank payment provider.

What it costs

Ozow publishes a full rate card for its Standard package. The figures below are as listed in October 2026. The pricing page does not say whether they include VAT. Ozow's terms quote one fee, the R0.50 account verification check, as excluding VAT, which suggests the list prices may exclude it too.

• Pay by bank, Capitec Pay (including recurring payments), Absa Pay, Nedbank Direct EFT, PayShap Request and crypto: 1.5% per transaction, minimum R1.00.
• Local cards: 2.85% for R0 to R249,999.99, 2.75% for R250,000 to R499,999.99 and 2.65% for R500,000 to R1,000,000, each with a R1.00 minimum. Apple Pay and Google Pay are included in the card product.
• International cards: 3.5%, minimum R1.00.
• Buy now, pay later (through Happy Pay): 4.99% + R4.00 per transaction.
• Voucher redemption: 4.5% for low-risk merchants and 6% for high-risk merchants.
• Payouts (instant or bulk) and real-time refunds: R3.00 each.
• Bank account verification (AVS): R0.50 per check, required for high-risk merchants on the first successful transaction from each bank account.
• WhatsApp payment-request messages: R0.35 each.
• No setup fee or subscription. An Enterprise package with tailored pricing, a client success manager and 24/7 priority support is available to businesses processing more than R1.5 million a month.

The card bands are labelled by transaction value ('for transactions from R0 - R249,999.99'), but the page does not say whether they apply to monthly volume. Ask Ozow how the band is worked out before you rely on the lower rates. As an illustration, a shop taking R100,000 a month entirely by pay by bank would pay R1,500. The same R100,000 on local cards in the lowest band would cost R2,850. The R1.00 minimum matters on small payments: a R50 bank payment costs R1.00, or 2%, rather than 75 cents. The card FAQ also says 'monthly service fees may apply', which the pricing page does not mention, so get any card fees confirmed in writing.

How payments work

Pay by bank is switched on for every new merchant; the direct bank-app methods are switched on by request. With Capitec, Absa, FNB and RMB, and Nedbank, the customer approves the payment inside their own bank's app, using a mobile number, account number or ID number, depending on the bank. With other South African banks they sign in to internet banking through Ozow's payment page. Once confirmed, a bank payment is irrevocable: there is no chargeback, although you can still refund it. Ozow sets no transaction limit of its own; the customer's bank limits apply. Merchants Ozow classes as high-risk must verify the customer's identity before taking pay-by-bank or PayShap payments. Cards are not self-service. An account manager switches them on after Ozow checks that your business type is supported, and card payments carry 3D Secure and can be charged back. Ozow offers a hosted checkout, an embedded iframe or modal, no-code payment links, and plugins for Shopify, WooCommerce, Magento, OpenCart, PrestaShop and Xero. Businesses without a company registration can use the Ozow.ME app instead of a full merchant account.

Settlement, holds and contract terms

Ozow collects your payments and pays them to you on a schedule. Pay-by-bank funds settle once a day, at 15:00 on weekdays and 08:00 on Saturdays, with no settlement on Sundays or public holidays. PayShap Request settles the next day, voucher and crypto payments typically the next day but up to three days, and card and BNPL payments typically once a week. The pricing page lists 'Next-day settlements' for both packages, which does not fit the weekly card cycle in Ozow's own documentation, so a business that relies on card revenue should plan for weekly cash flow. Fees are billed separately rather than taken out of each settlement. Refunds and payouts come from a float that you top up in advance, and payouts need separate approval.

Ozow does not publish its main merchant agreement, so we could not check its minimum term, notice period or any early-termination charge. Its FAQ says there are no activation or deactivation fees. The terms it does publish, covering PayShap, bank-app integrations and crypto, give Ozow wide discretion. It may hold funds before settling. If it, a sponsor bank or a partner suspects consumer fraud, it may freeze the related funds and suspend transactions without prior notice, for as long as the investigation lasts, and it is not liable for your losses unless it was grossly negligent or acted with wilful misconduct. It can switch payment methods on or off at its discretion, and continuing to use a service after a notified price change counts as accepting it. Ozow's complaints policy aims to resolve complaints within 14 days, or 30 to 60 days where third parties are involved, with three escalation levels.

Reputation and complaints

Ozow's public reviews are poor. As of October 2026, HelloPeter, South Africa's main complaints site, rates Ozow 1 out of 5 across 73 reviews. Only eight of those were posted in the last 12 months, too few for a TrustIndex score, and Ozow does not respond to reviews there. Most recent reviews come from consumers who say money left their bank account but never reached the merchant, or that their money had still not come back after weeks. One reviewer said a payout promised within 24 hours had not arrived four days later, and another reviewer said they could not get card payments activated. Gambling sites' HelloPeter pages also carry complaints about Ozow deposits not being credited. Ozow has no Trustpilot profile that we could find. Our searches found no lawsuit or regulatory enforcement action naming Ozow.

Leadership has also been unsettled. In April 2025 MyBroadband reported that co-founder and CEO Thomas Pays had been suspended for more than two months and faced a disciplinary hearing, that investors were unhappy with his management, and that major shareholder Kalon Venture Partners had been looking to sell its stake. Ozow declined to comment at the time. We found no public report of how the disciplinary process ended. By September 2026 Ozow was presenting Rachel Cowan, whom it named chief operating officer in 2022, as interim CEO. None of this has changed the published pricing or products, but merchants should know about it.

Who Ozow suits

Ozow suits a South African online business whose customers are comfortable paying from their bank accounts: e-commerce shops, billers, ticket sellers and other businesses that want to avoid chargebacks. For them, 1.5% with daily settlement and no subscription is a strong offer, and cards, PayShap, BNPL and vouchers can be added on the same integration. It is a weaker fit for a business that runs mainly on card revenue and needs it settled daily, takes most of its sales on a card terminal, accepts American Express, or cannot afford slow answers when a payment goes astray. Before signing, get the full merchant agreement, confirm whether the rates include VAT and how the card bands are measured, and ask whether any monthly card fee applies.