Telecommunications services provider Safaricom says that its long awaited MPesa API is already in use by selected partners and other developers can apply to use it.

During a Safaricom engagement event with developers at Nairobi's iHub, Ken Okwero, head of department - products and services development at Safaricom, said that the API is already being used within the company and with selected partners.

The most awaited API was the C2B whereby business can charge a client's account automatically without having the client use the full USSD commands.

"You are able to send a charging request to their account. It then pops up on the customers phone where they enter the service PIN," Okwero explained. Depending on the type of charge, customers do not need to enter their service PIN all the time.

"This is really ongoing and we have close to half of our partners who are using the service," Okwero said.

After applying for the API, Safaricom will run it through a test bed to ensure it works well before allowing partners to use it in their business, Okwero said.

He also added that the company has now successfully finished the MPesa platform transfer and now it is fully running within Kenya.

"As of last week on Friday (July 31), we finally shut down the previous MPesa platform and now everything is running in-country," he said. "It has been a very long two year complicated technical project."