Mgharba !
Sbah lkhir. I am currently listening to sma3 a sidi sma3 while writing this Newsletter so I hope this 3 minute newsletter about Payment methods, salaries and running in Morocco helps you move forward in your life. So sma3 a sidi/lalla sma3 …
Markets Overview
The Future of Payments in Morocco
A friend of mine asked me last week how come Morocco doesn’t have BNPL (Buy Now Pay Later) options and this led us to discuss the landscape of Morocco’s different payment methods.
But before we get to solutions let’s first discuss what type of payment methods do we have available in Morocco compared to other countries.
I don’t believe that going cashless would be the solution for Morocco but certainly using more electronic and digital payments would encourage companies and law makers to provide better solutions.
Hamdoullah, we start to see more and more options surfacing as years go by.
You can’t pay your phone bills automatically every month but you can for your Spotify and Netflix invoices.
Not every bank offers digitalized services but CIC popularized Apple Pay and Crédit Du Maroc offers a very good app that offers multiple solutions.
As for online payments, we’re heading towards the right direction … but it’s slow :
COD (Cash On Delivery) is a nightmare for e-commerce development.
For some reason banks still push the narrative that we need an E-buy card to purchase online. I have one, never used it.
MAD is unfortunately not (yet) a powerful enough currency to make purchases internationally so we have to convert MAD to $ with our annual allowance.
Here’s a tip if you struggle to make purchases online and get your card rejected.
Create a Paypal Account.
Link your Credit Card to your Paypal Account.
Make sure your bank activates all of your “dotation”.
This allows you to have a secure payment method (if the website offers Paypal Payments) every time your card gets rejected because your card is not accepted. I use this mostly for Facebook ads payment or other international purchases, works like a charm.
Benchmarking Your Salary in Morocco.
Talking about money in Morocco is taboo. So how can someone know if they are fairly compensated for their work ?
1 - Search Online.
I do a combination of research in both Glassdoor and Salaires.ma to have an initial range to what I should expect for my position and my seniority.
Although the range is very broad it gives you an estimation to where you are and what people in your position are making.
2 - Look for studies made by recruitment agencies.
Some agencies do annual reports on salaries per industry. It is very hard to find updated data but I got you covered. Here’s a study made by Michael Page in 2019.
3 - Ask people !
The most accurate way would be to reach out to friends or people that are in the position you want to be and ask them what compensation level they are at.
The marathon of Marrakech is close !
Are you coming ? If you are and you didn’t buy your ticket yet here’s where.
If you can’t because you never ran a mile in your life, here’s a guide I wrote on how to run your first 10K.
I’ll be there January 28th, waiting for you, in Marrakech !
They Make Morocco a Better Place :
For our first spotlight of people that make Morocco (or the world) a Better Place I wanted to talk about Yazid Bahraoui.
Yazid is a young Real Estate Developer (Promoteur Immobilier) who’s mission is to make real estate accessible to moroccans.
Finding relevant information about real estate can be a hassle. Thanks to people like Yazid, you now know the steps to follow if you wanted to dive into the wondrous world of real estate construction.
That’s it for this Monday,
Conquer,
Aladin from We Make Morocco A Better Place.