Western Union, Travel Wallet Team on Remittances in S. Korea

Western Union, which works in cross-border and cross-currency payments, announced Tuesday (Feb. 15) that it has teamed with Travel Wallet to offer money transfer services on that company’s Travel Wallet app.

In South Korea, Travel Wallet users will now gain the option of sending money through Western Union. The app will be available for both Android and iOS users, and customers will be able to fund cross-border money transfers even through their local accounts.

Cash and bank payouts in some countries is available and will further expand later on. In the next few months, Travel Wallet users will gain the ability to receive Western Union money transfers from the Travel Wallet app.

That will apply to transactions sent through Western Union’s digital money transfer services or Western Union’s Agent network.

“For 170 years, Western Union has put technology to work connecting people — bringing boundless possibilities within reach,” said K. Premmananth, head of network, Singapore, Indonesia and North Asia, Western Union. “Remittances connect people, places, economies and societies. We are delighted to offer our services to Travel Wallet users, enabling convenient and reliable financial flows powered by technology.”

Meanwhile, Travel Wallet CEO Hyungwoo Kim said the company was “excited to enable our customers to connect to their loved ones around the world through one of the world’s widest-reaching financial network.”

Western Union, posting its fourth-quarter results, showed more forward momentum in digital transactions, which were up in double-digit percentages year over year.

See also: Western Union’s Digital Money Transfer Business Now 24% of C2C Revenues

The consolidated top line for the period hit $1.3 billion, and was up 2% year over year as measured on a constant currency basis.

However, there were still difficulties — the revenue for the quarter was affected by the growth of digital money transfers and its Business Solutions segment, with a fall in retail money transfers.

According to new CEO Devin B. McGranahan, “The digital business has generated strong growth while our retail business declined due to uneven economic recovery negatively impacting our customers.”