Canadians can top up prepaid phones in PH with PayPal, TransferTo

TORONTO, Ontario – Without any transfer fees, Canadians can now use their PayPal account to instantly top up prepaid mobile phones of their relatives and friends in more than 100 countries including the Philippines.

PayPal today announced that it has teamed up with TransferTo, a global airtime remittance leader, to offer mobile airtime top-up in Canada.

All the Canadian-based sender needs is her PayPal account and the mobile number of the recipient, to top up a prepaid mobile phone using a smartphone, tablet or computer on www.paypal-mobiletopup.ca.

“Mobile phones help connect people with their communities, and give them access to education, employment and essential medical and financial services,” said Cameron Schmidt, general manager, PayPal Canada.

“With today’s announcement, Canadians can extend a lifeline to their grandmother who needs to frequently call her doctor in Manila or help their sister access the Internet from her mobile phone in Cebu City,” Schmidt added.

According to Statistics Canada, one out of five people living in Canada was born abroad. A large number of Canadian immigrants are from the Philippines, which has heavy mobile phone usage.

In 2011, more than 152,000 Canadians were born in the Philippines, representing 13.1 percent of all immigrants in Canada. There are more mobile connections (114.6 million) in the Philippines than there are people (100.9 million).

Of those mobile phone connections, 95 percent are prepaid. Prepaid mobile phones registered with leading mobile phone service providers can now be topped up by Filipino Canadians with the new service announced today.

“Every month, I send money to my mother back home in Manila to help her pay for her phone usage,” said Josephine Bungcayao, who immigrated to Canada from the Philippines. “I am so grateful PayPal now allows me a way to top up her prepaid phone so she can stay in touch with me and her family and friends.”

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