If you are sending 300 pounds home to Ghana and it is going to a family MTN MoMo wallet, the cheapest way to send it is one of these five apps: LemFi, Wise, Sendwave, WorldRemit, or Remitly. Any of them lands close to 4,560 cedis in your relative’s wallet in minutes, for a total cost of a few pounds at most.
What you should not do is open your own bank’s app, the one you use for everyday banking. Barclays, NatWest, HSBC and Lloyds do not send straight to MoMo. They send to a Ghanaian bank account through the international bank system, which is slower, more expensive, and drops the money in the wrong place, since most Ghanaian families move their day-to-day money on MoMo, not on a bank card.
The e-levy is gone. The cash-out fee is not.
You may have heard that Ghana takes a slice of every mobile-money transfer. That was the e-levy. It was introduced in May 2022 at 1.5 percent, cut to 1 percent in January 2023, and then repealed by President Mahama on 2 April 2025. As of July 2026 the state charges nothing on the mobile-money transfer itself.
There is one small charge left, and it is on your relative’s side, not yours. When she goes to an MTN MoMo agent to take physical cash out of the wallet, MTN charges her a fee. On a normal-sized send, that fee is either 1 percent of the amount, or a flat 20 cedis, whichever the size lands in. On 300 pounds, which is roughly 4,560 cedis at the real exchange rate today, that flat 20-cedi charge works out to about 1 pound 30 in sterling.
You avoid that charge by keeping the money on the wallet. In Ghana, MoMo is not just a way to hold cash. She can pay a market seller, buy phone airtime, pay a school, or send it on to a cousin, all from the wallet, without paying the cash-out fee. If she needs physical notes, a single larger withdrawal costs less than two small ones (see below).
Why sending straight to MoMo is cheaper
MTN MoMo is the wallet on your family member’s SIM. Nearly every Ghanaian family uses it. Receiving money into a MoMo wallet is free on the receiver’s side. The apps below have all built a direct connection into MoMo, so pounds go in on your phone and cedis land on hers, in minutes, at close to the real exchange rate.
The real exchange rate is the one Google shows you when you search what the pound is worth in cedis. In July 2026 that is around 15.2 to 15.35 cedis to the pound. Any app that gives you a rate much lower than that is keeping the difference for itself.
The two other MoMo wallets in Ghana are Telecel Cash (the old Vodafone Cash, rebranded in early 2024, so if she still calls it Vodafone Cash she means the same wallet) and AirtelTigo Money. Most of the apps here can pay into MTN and AirtelTigo. Fewer offer Telecel Cash direct; check inside the app before you send.
The apps that use the real exchange rate
LemFi. No flat fee to Ghana. The whole cost sits in a small exchange-rate margin. Money to MoMo in minutes. LemFi has become the default for a lot of the UK Ghanaian community, and on a 200 to 300 pound send it usually lands within a pound of Wise.
Wise. A small percentage fee, roughly 0.5 to 1.5 percent of what you send, at the real exchange rate. Pays into MTN, AirtelTigo, Telecel Cash, or a Ghana bank account. The amount Wise shows you before you press send is the amount that arrives. If you are new to sending money and want the app that shows its working most clearly, this is the one.
Sendwave. No visible fee. The whole cost is in the exchange rate, about 1 to 3 percent off the real rate depending on the day. Pays into MTN MoMo and AirtelTigo Money. Simple app. A pound or two behind LemFi and Wise on total cost.
WorldRemit. A small flat fee (usually a pound or two) plus a rate that is 1 to 2.5 percent off the real rate. Pays into MTN MoMo, a Ghana bank, or a cash pickup point. Reliable, middle of the pack on price.
Remitly. New customers get an enhanced exchange rate on the first 500 pounds sent (running through 31 December 2026), which can make the very first transfer the cheapest of the lot. After that first 500, the rate settles back and it is worth checking Remitly against LemFi and Wise before each send. Remitly offers a fast option to MoMo and a cheaper slower option to a bank account; on a routine family send, the fast one is what you want.
What to watch for
Cash-out at the agent, not the transfer. MTN’s cash-out charge is either 1 percent of the amount taken (between 50 and 2,000 cedis) or a flat 20 cedis (above 2,000). If she takes 3,000 cedis out in one visit, the fee is 20 cedis. If she takes it in two 1,500-cedi visits, each is 15 cedis, so 30 total. Fewer, larger withdrawals cost less.
Money on MoMo is not physical cash yet. The moment the cedis land, she can see them in her wallet and spend them on the wallet: airtime, market bills, sending to another wallet. Physical notes require an agent, and most agents keep shop hours. So a transfer you send from London at 22:00 is real in her wallet at 22:00 Ghana time, but the notes are not available until roughly 07:00 the next morning, unless there is a MoMo-enabled ATM nearby.
Ignore any app that quotes zero fee and hides the rate. If a UK bank app quotes zero fee on a transfer to Ghana but does not show you the exchange rate it will use, the cost is inside the rate. To check, open the bank app and one of the MoMo apps side by side, put the same pound amount into both, and compare the cedi figure at the bottom. That is the only number that matters.
Telecel Cash payout may not be there in every app. MTN and AirtelTigo are near universal. Telecel Cash coverage varies. If your relative uses Telecel Cash, either check inside the app first, or send her to a friend or family member’s MTN MoMo instead.
Wallet limits. MTN MoMo has a daily transaction limit and a limit on how much a wallet can hold at once. For a routine family send of a few hundred pounds these limits will not be a problem. For a bigger one-off, see below.
For bigger one-off sends
For school fees, a medical bill, or any single send above roughly 1,000 pounds, MoMo is still fine for the transfer itself, but you should check two things.
First, ask her which wallet is easier for the size she is receiving. A single large amount hitting a MoMo wallet is fine, but she may need to plan how to take it out (agent visits, a MoMo-enabled ATM, or paying the school directly from the wallet where the school accepts it).
Second, for very large one-off sends where the money needs to end up in a bank account (GCB, Ecobank, Stanbic, Absa Ghana), Wise pays into Ghana bank accounts directly, usually within one working day. That is often the cleanest way to move a school-fees-sized amount, because it lands in a form the school will accept without extra steps.
What to open
For a routine 200 to 300 pound send to family MTN MoMo on a weekday: LemFi or Wise. They usually land within a pound of each other. If it is your first ever Remitly transfer, the promotional rate on the first 500 pounds can put it slightly ahead of both for that one send.
For a send to Telecel Cash: check inside the app first. Wise is the most likely to have it directly.
For a one-off larger than about 1,000 pounds, where the money needs to be in a bank account at the end: Wise to a Ghana bank account, in one working day.
If you were about to open your own bank’s app for this transfer: don’t. The transfer looks free on the screen. The exchange rate it uses is not.