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dLocal, the Uruguay-headquartered cross-border payments platform, and inDrive, a global bid-based ride-hailing company have joined forces to roll out cashless payments for rides in South Africa.
The partnership aims to solve one of the major operational challenges facing mobility platforms in emerging markets: how to collect fares from passengers and simultaneously pay out driver earnings through a single integration.
As part of this tie-up, inDrive passengers can now pay by card directly within the ride-hailing app, while drivers will receive their earnings through local South African payment rails.
In a press statement, dLocal explains that going cashless in emerging markets is “rarely straightforward“. For ride-hailing platforms, the challenge is two-fold: one, they must accept payments from riders while also disbursing earnings to drivers, all in real time, and in a way that adheres to local financial infrastructure.
Through dLocal’s infrastructure, inDrive can now accept local cards in-app, process real-time payouts via PayShap, split transactions automatically between the driver’s share and the platform fee, and disburse driver earnings through South African domestic rails. This will also reduce dependence on cash, lower exposure to fraud and improve security for drivers on the road. While in-app payments take prominence, cash will remain available where it is still the preferred option, making this an expansion of choice rather than an outright replacement.
The key pillar of this integration is dLocal’s payments stack, which handles the complexity of local financial rails so that platforms like inDrive do not have to build local market tools from scratch. South Africa is the first market where the companies have run this integration end-to-end. Why South Africa? Cards already account for 63% of all digital transactions, eWallets are gaining ground, cash is losing share, and the country’s ride-hailing market is projected to nearly triple by 2033.
“South Africa is a key market for inDrive, and getting payments right here matters, not only for the passengers who want a convenient cashless experience but also for the drivers who depend on fast, reliable payouts,” said Ashif Black, Country Representative in South Africa at inDrive. “dLocal gives us the ability to do both, in one integration, in a market where that combination wasn’t available before.”
Barrie Swart, Country Manager (South Africa) at dLocal, said, “Making payments work in emerging markets takes more than a technical integration. It takes local infrastructure, local relationships, and an understanding of how money actually moves in each market. This partnership in South Africa is a strong example of what becomes possible when all of that is in place.”
With coverage of local payment methods spanning over 44 markets, including local cards, mobile money, bank transfers, real-time payments, and eWallets, dLocal says the same model can be extended to additional markets Africa, the Middle East, and Latin America through a single connection already in place.
