$10 million per year. That’s how much global brands miss out on revenue. It’s the flip side of the R360 million local consumers pay in offshore card fees each year.
Why? Because most global brands rely on international processing to sell to South African customers. Localisation comes with a long list of blockers: local entity requirements, unpredictable regulation, cross-border complexity, and a payment landscape that looks nothing like home. Merchants struggle to enter, customers struggle to pay.
The result is a persistent gap between global platforms and local people. One that limits growth, excludes users, and keeps South Africa off the list of priority markets.
“It’s an approach with significant and costly blind spots,” says Ruaan Botha, Precium’s co-founder and CEO.
“First, it locks out the majority of banked South Africans whose debit cards have international payments switched off by default. Second, it penalises those who can pay, by tagging every transaction with foreign bank fees. And third, it exposes merchants to unnecessary costs: higher interchange, double FX spreads, avoidable declines, chargebacks, and opaque ‘bundle’ fees that obscure true performance.”
“But global merchants have another option, and it doesn’t require local incorporation.”
How to localise without local incorporation
The key lies in a proprietary model developed by Precium and Novo42 over the past 18 months. Today, Novo42 offers the only compliant Merchant of Record (MoR) solution with regulatory approvals in place to give global merchants access to local payments without requiring a local entity.
As the MoR, Novo42 assumes full legal and financial responsibility for each transaction. This includes managing customer disputes and chargebacks, supporting domestic payment methods, handling FX exposure, and ensuring compliant cross-border settlement.
When paired with Precium’s high-performance acceptance and payout infrastructure, the result is a model built for global merchants: reliable, flexible, integration-ready, and grounded in deep compliance and tax expertise. Funds are collected locally and settled offshore, with no changes to your global platform, pricing, or contracts.
Purpose-built for global to feel local
“Global platforms, whether for streaming, gaming, or learning, already view localisation as a priority,” says Erica Bester, MD of Novo42. “The merchants we work with have often localised other parts of their experience for local customers, such as geo-based pricing for subscriptions. But until now, they’ve lacked a streamlined means to enter and operate in South Africa.”
“Our model ensures global brands can operate in South Africa as effortlessly as they do at home. But more than moving money, we help them meet customers where they are. True localisation means more than integrating every payment method, it means understanding how people earn, spend, and make decisions. Financial realities in South Africa are as varied as its people. Our job is to help global brands navigate that complexity and create payment experiences that feel familiar, trusted, and built for real life here.”
Connect with us to understand our all-in-one solution to compliance, payments and FX.
