The Café As Money Remittance Center

Have you experienced queuing or seen the queues in a money remittance center in your area? If you did, you should have an idea of how brisk is the business of popular brands like Western Union for international money transfer transactions and LBC for domestic money remittance. Money remittance especially those coming from abroad is actually very important for the Philippine economy. With millions of Filipinos working abroad in order to support families that they left behind in the country, money remittance is really big business for Western Union who controls a big share of the market here.

The big bulk of the money transfer business are being served by domestic banks and specialized companies like Western Union. They have branches in different locations in the country but the long queues I mentioned above only shows that there are still areas that we can say are underserved at present. Actually pawnshops, telegram and cargo companies had already entered the business long time ago but still, I should say, there are rooms for others to join the fray.

Do you know that an Internet café is very qualified to become money remittance center? An Internet café has the requisites to handle money transfer transactions. The establishment is always online and all that is needed is a web portal provided by principal money transfer company where a transaction can be verified before cash is given to recipient of the transfer.  With enough additional capital for the business model, an Internet café owner can engaged in both sending and receiving money for its customers.

Actually, this additional income source for Internet café owners in the the form of handling fee from money transfer service is already available in some areas. The image shown on this blog post is a proof of this additional business opportunity for Internet café owners. I shall discuss the details on how to enter into this business in partnership with Western Union in a future blog.

Before I close this article on this income opportunity for a café business, allow me to say that the security of a shop against the risks of robbery holdup and burglary is very important factor to consider before a café owner decides to enter the business. Firstly, know what is difference between burglary and theft.  Actually, in the case of a robbery holdup after a transaction to send money to someone, the loss is double the amount of the money you receive from a cash remitter. Why? Because aside from the cash taken by the holdupper, the café owner will also lose the money that will be debited from his account to cover the remittance transaction.

Other than the example above that may happen in an Internet café located in a risky area, the business of being a money remittance center is worth considering by an owner of a secured Internet café. This is one opportunity that may augment the income of a café located in an area with many families whose members are overseas workers.