GCS International, a mobile payment platform provider for the Dominican Republic, announced it will expand its footprint to include Colombia, Guatemala, El Salvador and Puerto Rico. The tPago platform lets users pay bills, make person-to-person money transfers, pay at the point of sale and top up their mobile devices using their mobile devices.

"TPago is one of the few mobile payment platforms that can effectively show that it is already operating successfully in [Latin America]," said GCS CEO Brian Paniagua in the announcement.  

Paniagua said the service is growing quickly and has seen a 57 percent increase in customer volume in the past 12 months. TPago has more than 300,000 users in the Dominican Republic. The platform processes 600,000 transactions per month. In its first 25 months, it has handled 10,800,000 transactions worth more than $69 million, Paniagua said.

Unlike other mobile payment schemes, tPago can be accessed using a feature phone, a benefit to low income consumers who may not have access to smarpthones. Additionally, no Internet connection is required and users don't burn their cellphone plan minutes making transactions.

GCS also announced that it's planning to launch services like Prepaid tPago for the unbanked. The services will be available in Colombia and El Salvador. Currently, users must link a bank account to tPago to access its services, but GCS is looking to reach out to consumers without access to basic financial services.

For more stories like this visit the Money Transfer/P2P research center.