Transfast and Brac Bank have launched online money transfer services for customers of the US-based company, enabling them to make direct deposits into the accounts of the Bangladeshi bank.

Under the partnership, Transfast customers will be able to send money online, via mobile or through agent locations around the globe to the Brac bank accounts of their friends and family in Bangladesh.

The beneficiaries will receive the money in their accounts right away or can choose to pick up the amount within minutes at thousands of convenient locations throughout Bangladesh.

In addition to direct-to-bank deposits, Transfast customers can pick up cash from any of Brac Bank's 166 branches, 50 SME unit offices and more than 100,000 agents of bKash, the country's leading mobile-based financial service provider owned by Brac Bank. 

“Brac Bank is one of the leading banks in Bangladesh and a pioneer in sophisticated technology in serving all its clients, and we are excited to offer our customers the ability to deposit money instantly and securely there,” said Samish Kumar, CEO of Transfast, a US-based company. 

An official of Brac Bank yesterday said the two parties struck a deal about four years ago. Until now, the beneficiaries needed to visit a branch to receive the amount they were sent from abroad.

But under the new arrangement, the customers will receive the money directly into their accounts, which will save their time, he said.

In 2014, the country saw some $15 billion in remittances flow into the country, making it the world's eighth-largest remittance corridor, according to the World Bank.

Brac Bank, the country's largest SME lender, currently accounts for almost 4 percent of the total remittances to Bangladesh. 

“We are pleased to be the first bank in Bangladesh to partner with Transfast to launch an instant bank deposit service,” said Syed Mahbubur Rahman, managing director of Brac Bank.

The partnership further highlights the bank's commitment to increasing the remittance flow into Bangladesh through new technologies and partnerships, he said.

Transfast is a leading international money transfer and payments company in the $608 billion annual global remittance industry, operates a proprietary network of over 300,000 payment points across more than 100 countries in the Americas, Asia, Europe, and Africa.