Kenyans who believed switching SIM cards could sidestep old mobile loans are confronting a different reality, as fresh complaints online push M-Shwari to clarify that its recovery system follows a borrower’s national ID rather than a phone number, tightening the link between digital credit and formal identity in a market where millions rely on short-term mobile loans for daily cash flow.
Posts across X, Facebook groups, and consumer forums describe similar experiences. Users report repaying or abandoning balances on one line, registering a new number, and later seeing deductions, reminders, or account restrictions resurface.
The product, which runs on Safaricom’s mobile money platform in partnership with NCBA Bank, states that the confusion stems from a basic design choice: loans are at the ID level from the moment a customer signs up.
That structure means a new SIM registered under the same ID does not create a clean slate. Recovery can still be triggered through that line or other accounts linked to the same identification.
By contrast, people who receive recycled numbers are not liable for someone else’s debt, because the obligation remains tied to the original borrower’s ID, not the handset or SIM now in use.
Credit bureau listings follow the same logic. Missed payments and defaults attach to the individual’s ID profile. The bank also reserves the right of lien, allowing it to recover outstanding amounts from any account held under that ID, a provision some users say they only discover after funds move.
Customers can check which numbers are linked to their ID by dialling *106#, a step consumer advocates increasingly urge online, as identity-based lending becomes the norm rather than the exception.
