Kwacha on Google Play Store: Now You Can Buy/Rent Movies

Ladies and gentlemen, this is the moment you’ve all been waiting for… to rent or buy movies from Google Play Store in Kwacha!!! Well, even if you weren’t necessarily waiting, it’s here now and guess what, you can use it! Gone are the days of waiting for that movie download hookup to bring you that flash drive to transfer that movie which you’ve just been dying to watch. Now all you have to do it click, click, click and watch on your phone or even PC.

Is it a coincidence that when the Kwacha depreciates drastically certain opportunities open up? It appears more favourable to sell movies now as the cheapest one for a dollar is going for K6 (ZMW 6) flat. The price list consists of denominations ranges: 6, 11, 17, 23, 57, 85, respectively.

All other categories in the Google Play Store remain US dollar based. However, this is a good indication that the whole Play Store could actually be Kwacha based soon enough. Consequently, Zambian developers may launch free and paid-for apps via Google Play with prices denominated in Kwacha. If Google rolled out Kwacha for the whole Store, it will essentially also enable developers to monetize their apps more efficiently. However, how sustainable will that move be considering our unstable currency? The future is quite bleak.

The Next Web covered a story on Goran Kukurin, who is behind Worldscope Webcams, and had his app removed from Google Play because it was using PayPal to let users upgrade to an ad-free experience. However, Kukurin explained that buying Ad-free version via Google play store was not possible, because his country (Croatia) is not on the list of supported locations for merchants which are allowed to sell paid applications on Google store. Worldscope Webcams has since been reinstated but the issue not fixed for Kukurin because Croatia is not on the list.

The full list of countries with the option to set prices in their local currency is as follows, some but not all already have local payment options for developers: Australia, Bolivia, Bulgaria, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Egypt, Indonesia, Latvia, Lebanon, Lithuania, Malaysia, Morocco, Pakistan, Peru, Philippines, Romania, Saudi Arabia, South Africa, Thailand, Turkey, Ukraine, United Arab Emirates, Venezuela and Vietnam.

So far, the iOS App Store remains dominantly US dollar based and users have no access to purchasing in local currency even for movies. Furthermore, the right tools are needed in order to indulge in this new feature. For instance, you will need a debit card or credit card that is enabled to make purchases online by your bank. If you’re not sure, then call them and verify.