Supplier payments into South Africa

Trade payment infrastructure for Southern Africa.

We start with the payment that holds up the most trade in this region: paying your South African suppliers. Know exactly what your supplier receives and what you pay before you commit, settle once from your local bank account, and get on with buying stock.

Built for importers, wholesalers, distributors and contractors buying from South Africa. We onboard businesses market by market. Paying a South African supplier this week? We will check their account before you send it, whether or not your corridor is open yet. Or book a discovery call.

The problem

You are not buying a payment. You are buying stock.

Nobody in your business wakes up wanting a better payment rail. You want the container to leave the supplier's yard. Four things reliably stop that from happening, and all four of them happen inside the payment.

You do not know your landed cost

You agree a price with your supplier, then the bank applies a rate you only see afterwards and deducts charges nobody quoted. By the time the payment clears, the margin you priced the stock on has moved.

The money goes quiet

It leaves your account and then nobody can tell you where it is. Your supplier says it has not arrived. Your bank says it has been sent. Neither of them is lying, and neither of them can help you.

The goods sit in the warehouse

Most South African suppliers will not release stock until the funds reflect. Every extra day in the payment is an extra day your shelves stay empty and your customer buys from somebody else.

Getting foreign currency is its own job

In several markets in the region, obtaining hard currency through the banking system means queuing, allocation and waiting. That is before anyone has processed a payment.

How it works

Four steps, and you only touch two of them.

The work that used to be yours — sourcing currency, chasing the correspondent bank, explaining the shortfall to your supplier — is the work we take on.

  1. 01

    Tell us about the payment

    Who your supplier is, what you owe them and the South African account they bank with. For a new supplier we verify those details with them directly before anything moves.

  2. 02

    See the landed amount

    One document showing the rand your supplier receives, the local currency you pay, the rate applied and every fee, itemised. The quote is held for a fixed window so the number cannot move while you get it approved.

  3. 03

    You pay once, locally

    From your own business account, in your own country, in your own currency. No foreign currency to source, no correspondent bank chain, no separate SWIFT charge appearing a week later.

  4. 04

    Your supplier is paid in rand

    Their South African bank account is credited with the exact figure on the quote. You both get a confirmation with a reference your supplier can reconcile against the invoice.

Why businesses trust SwapEazi

Built for how Southern African businesses actually buy.

You are moving real money for real stock, often to a supplier you cannot afford to disappoint. Here is why importers, wholesalers and distributors across the region let us handle that payment.

Built for Southern African trade

Purpose-built for businesses buying from South African suppliers, not a global payments network with our region added on. The corridors, the currencies and the support all point one way: your supplier in South Africa, paid in rand.

Licensed financial partners

Regulated payment services, including fund collection, foreign exchange and settlement, are delivered through licensed financial partners in each market. We can share a partner's regulatory details on request so you can verify them yourself.

We never hold your money

SwapEazi does not hold customer funds. Your payment moves from a licensed partner straight to your supplier's bank, so there is no pooled balance of ours for a creditor, a court or a bad quarter to reach.

One price, quoted up front

The exchange rate and every fee are on the quote before you commit, and held for the stated window. The licensed partner sets the rate. We show it as given and add nothing to it, and there is no charge that turns up on your statement instead of on the quote.

Proof your bookkeeper can use

Every payment produces a confirmation with the invoice reference, the rate applied, the fees charged and the receiving account. It reconciles against the invoice without a phone call, and it is what you hand your auditor.

You always know where the payment is

From quote to the moment your supplier is paid, you can see the status of the payment, and so can they. If a route is not open yet, we tell you before you send a cent rather than after.

Where we operate

Southern Africa into South Africa. That is the whole map.

We are not a global payments network and we are not trying to become one. One region, one destination, opened one market at a time as a licensed partner is confirmed on both ends. Here is exactly where each route stands today.

Payment routes from Southern African markets into South Africa, with the current status of each
You pay fromCurrencySupplier receivesStatusWhat that means
NamibiaNADZARWaitlistJoin the waitlist for this market and we will confirm your corridor with you directly.
LesothoLSLZARWaitlistJoin the waitlist for this market and we will confirm your corridor with you directly.
EswatiniSZLZARWaitlistJoin the waitlist for this market and we will confirm your corridor with you directly.
BotswanaBWPZARWaitlistJoin the waitlist for this market and we will confirm your corridor with you directly.
ZambiaZMWZARWaitlistJoin the waitlist for this market and we will confirm your corridor with you directly.
MalawiMWKZARWaitlistJoin the waitlist for this market and we will confirm your corridor with you directly.
ZimbabweUSDZARWaitlistJoin the waitlist for this market and we will confirm your corridor with you directly.
MozambiqueMZNZARWaitlistJoin the waitlist for this market and we will confirm your corridor with you directly.
ZimbabweZWGZARWaitlistJoin the waitlist for this market and we will confirm your corridor with you directly.

Namibia, Lesotho and Eswatini have no exchange rate

All three sit in the Common Monetary Area with the rand as legal tender and their own currency pegged to it one for one. What you pay and what your supplier receives is the same number. Since September 2024 those payments no longer clear as domestic transfers and route internationally instead, which is the delay we remove.

We open corridors where the trade already is

Zimbabwe, Zambia and Mozambique carry the region's hardest currency constraints and its most persistent demand for South African stock, which is exactly why they are on this list. Join the waitlist for your market and we will confirm your corridor with you directly.

Your corridor is not open yet. This is

Whatever we can do for you today, we should do today.

Corridors open market by market, and yours may be a waitlist for a while. So here is something useful in the meantime, free, with nothing to buy at the end of it.

The most common fraud in cross-border trade is not a fake invoice. It is a real invoice, from a supplier you genuinely buy from, arriving with the banking details changed. It passes every check your business runs, because everything on it is true except the account number. The money goes, the stock does not, and the supplier still wants paying.

Tell us who you are about to pay. We confirm the account belongs to the business named on the invoice, and we confirm it with the supplier on contact details we source ourselves rather than the ones printed on the document. Your bank does not check this. It takes us a day and it costs you nothing.

What you get back
  • A written answer within one business dayFrom a person, not an autoresponder.
  • One of three outcomesThe account matches the business, it does not, or we could not confirm it. We tell you which.
  • Confirmed independentlyWe reach the supplier on details we find ourselves, never the ones on the invoice you were sent.
  • No account, no card, no obligationYou do not have to pay through us, now or ever.

A check performed by a person, not an instant lookup, and no check removes the risk entirely. Where we cannot confirm something we say so, rather than implying that we did.

What it costs

One price per payment, quoted before you commit.

No subscription, no setup fee, no minimum monthly volume. You see the whole cost as a single figure and as a breakdown, and the number you approve is the number that leaves your account.

Pricing is set per corridor, because the cost of moving each currency differs. Larger invoices and regular monthly volume carry a lower rate, quoted to you directly.

See the full breakdown
What a quote contains
  • The rand your supplier receives
  • The local-currency amount you pay
  • The exchange rate applied, to four decimals
  • The SwapEazi fee, as an amount and a percentage
  • The collection and payout partner costs
  • How long the quote is held
  • When the funds are expected to arrive

If a cost is not on that list, it does not exist on your payment.

Who this is for

Businesses that buy from South Africa on a schedule.

If your supplier is in Johannesburg, Durban, Cape Town or Pretoria and you are paying them from somewhere else in the region, you are who we built this for. Company size matters less than whether the payment is repeating.

Retail and FMCG

Supermarkets, wholesalers and distributors restocking from South African suppliers on a weekly or monthly cycle.

Building and hardware

Cement, steel, roofing, fittings and finishes, where a delayed payment holds up a whole site.

Automotive and parts

Dealers, workshops and parts importers buying from South African distributors and OEM agents.

Agriculture inputs

Seed, fertiliser, chemicals and equipment, where the payment window is set by the season and does not move.

Pharmacy and medical

Pharmacies, clinics and medical suppliers buying stock and consumables from South African wholesalers.

Machinery and industrial

Plant, spares and service contracts, where deposits and progress payments have to land on agreed dates.

Straight answers

The questions we get before the first payment.

These come up in nearly every conversation, so they belong on the website rather than in a call you have to book.

Why use this instead of my bank?

Because your bank prices the payment after it has left. With SwapEazi the exchange rate and every fee are fixed on the quote before you commit, the payment is targeted to land in the same business day rather than the same week, and you never have to go and source foreign currency to make it happen.

Why not use an intermediary I already know?

Informal channels move money, but they leave you with nothing: no confirmation your supplier can reconcile, no record for your auditor, and no recourse when a payment goes missing. Every SwapEazi payment produces documentation your bookkeeper and your supplier can both work from.

How do I know my supplier actually got paid?

You get a confirmation showing the receiving account, the amount credited and the invoice reference, and so does your supplier. If they say it has not arrived, that document settles the question in one message.

Who is regulated in this?

Regulated payment services, including fund collection, foreign exchange and settlement, are delivered through licensed financial partners in each market. SwapEazi is the software your business uses to manage those supplier payments and see them through, and it never holds your funds.

Do I have to change anything on my side?

No. You keep your bank, your accounting system and your supplier relationships. Your supplier is paid into the same South African account already on their invoice, so nothing changes for them either.

Is this built for a business like mine?

If you buy stock, materials or equipment from South African suppliers on a repeating basis, yes. Wholesalers, supermarkets, pharmacies, hardware and building suppliers, FMCG distributors, agricultural and mining suppliers are the businesses this was built around. It is designed for commercial invoices, not personal transfers.

Who is behind this

A payments company, built by someone who has run payments.

SwapEazi is a South African company. It was started by a payments product manager with more than ten years inside the systems that move money, including Nedbank, Absa, Investec, Nederlandse Spoorwegen and EVBox.

That matters here for one reason. Knowing how settlement, exchange control and reconciliation actually behave is what stops a cross-border payments business from making promises it cannot keep on the day something goes wrong.

About the company
Registered
South Africa
Customer funds held
None, at any point
Regulated legs
Via licensed partners
Corridors
Southern Africa into South Africa

Trade should not wait on a payment.

We are onboarding businesses market by market. Join the waitlist and we will come back with how SwapEazi works for your corridor, your volumes and your suppliers.