Pearl Bank to reward Wendi users with fuel vouchers

KAMPALA, Uganda – Pearl Bank, Uganda’s government-owned lender, has launched a three-month campaign that will reward customers of its Wendi mobile wallet with fuel vouchers, smartphones and cash, as rising fuel prices put pressure on households and transport workers.

The campaign, called Wendi Ku Win, was launched on Friday at the Old Taxi Park in the capital, Kampala, one of the busiest transport hubs in East Africa, in partnership with the Uganda Taxi Operators Federation (UTOF).

Under the campaign, customers who make transactions of 10,000 Ugandan shillings or more on the wallet will be entered into weekly draws. Prizes include fuel vouchers worth 30,000, 50,000 and 100,000 shillings, smartphones, household appliances such as microwaves and blenders, and cash rewards of 100,000 shillings.

Andrew Kabeera, an executive director at Pearl Bank, said the choice of venue was deliberate.

“We are at the taxi park not in error; it is by choice. Fuel prices have gone high, and we thought about how we could support the people we have here,” Kabeera told reporters at the launch.

“As a bank for the people, a government bank, we cannot sit back and not stand with the people when the economy is tightening,” he said.

Kabeera said customers could use Wendi to pay for fuel without being charged, while also standing a chance to win prizes.

Support for taxi operators

Minibus taxis are the backbone of public transport in Uganda, carrying millions of commuters daily in Kampala and other towns. Operators have long said they struggle to access affordable credit.

Kabeera said the bank wanted to work with taxi operators organised in savings and credit cooperative organisations, known locally as SACCOs. He said organised groups could receive short-term support, such as money advanced in the morning for operators to start the day, to be repaid in the evening.

“That is not possible if people are not organised,” he said, praising UTOF chairman Rashid Ssekindi for his efforts to bring operators together under one body.

Kabeera added that the bank was also looking at financing electric taxis in future.

“In the future, we shall be able to finance, for example, taxis which are using electric power rather than the fuel we are talking about now,” he said.

The plans could address a long-standing concern in the sector. In September 2025, Ssekindi said taxi operators were still struggling to secure financing to buy new vehicles for their members.

Kabeera urged the public to register on the wallet, noting that sign-up is free and a customer’s phone number serves as their account number.

Speaking in Luganda, Uganda’s most widely spoken local language, he said the bank hoped the economic situation would ease within the three months the campaign runs.

Growing digital wallet

Wendi was launched in November 2023 and can be used without a bank account or a smartphone by dialling *229# on any mobile phone. It is also available as an app.

According to the bank, the wallet has more than one million subscribers and works with more than 13,000 agents across the country. Users can save, send money, pay bills and make fuel and merchant payments, as well as receive Western Union transfers.

The bank says savers on Wendi earn annual interest of 12.5 per cent, and groups can use the platform to manage their savings in real time.

Pearl Bank says the wallet has also been used to pay Parish Development Model funds, a flagship government programme aimed at lifting households out of subsistence farming, and to send relief money to victims of landslides in Bududa, in eastern Uganda.