{"id":24679,"date":"2017-12-04T13:02:17","date_gmt":"2017-12-04T17:02:17","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/cfi-blog.org\/?p=24679"},"modified":"2018-09-07T20:49:45","modified_gmt":"2018-09-07T20:49:45","slug":"i-need-cash-when-i-need-it-where-i-need-it-how-i-need-it","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cfi.accion-staging.flywheelsites.com\/i-need-cash-when-i-need-it-where-i-need-it-how-i-need-it\/","title":{"rendered":"I Need Cash WHEN I Need It, WHERE I Need It, HOW I Need It"},"content":{"rendered":"
If digital financial services are so convenient and affordable, why are uptake and usage rates among individuals with lower incomes so low? Monique Cohen explores the mismatch between products and money management needs.<\/em><\/p>\n > Posted by\u00a0Monique Cohen<\/em><\/p>\n This maxim governs much of our financial lives, rich or poor. Yet, we offer financial services to the unbanked and underbanked, largely ignoring it. The thinking around customer centrality as it affects financial services for the poor emphasizes appropriately responding to people\u2019s needs and wants for financial services. But, as Kim Wilson pointed out<\/a>, this is still not happening:<\/p>\n We have an agenda, which is this: please be our customer, have your needs, express them so long as they are about digital payments or failing that, using a bank account \u2013 a lot \u2013 and preferably, digitally. Else, we don\u2019t give a damn. We don\u2019t care about your archaic methods\u2026 We desperately want and need you to modernize, to become just like us. Otherwise we have no justification for all the work we do and all the money we spend.<\/em><\/p>\n Until now the perceived drivers of uptake of digital financial services (DFS) have been their assumed attributes of convenience, timeliness and affordability, relative to current formal and informal financial service offerings. However, with uptake and usage levels of only 30 percent for digital financial services, it is clear that this rationale falls short. Impediments to high usage continue to be overlooked.<\/p>\n What has to change if we wish to have more users move toward a \u2018cash lite\u2019 economy? What have we missed?<\/p>\n Financial products tend to be viewed through a lens of functionality. Timely access to credit can enable an entrepreneur to grow a business or meet regular financial obligations such as rent or school fees, especially when cash flow is variable. But for many poor customers, use of financial services is not about choosing Plan A, but about matching what is available to the need of the moment. These behaviors are not always optimal, neither for them nor for providers. Several years ago Equity Bank in Kenya noticed a high rate of usage of working capital loans for school fees. Similarly the encouragement to save is framed around the provision of access to savings tools, ignoring the stability and level of income needed to generate a surplus that can be put aside.<\/p>\n Ann Cotton, in response to financial service providers\u2019 puzzlement with the lower-than-anticipated rates of adoption of financial products, noted that<\/a>:<\/p>\n I hear, \u201cWhy do poor people make such bad decisions?\u201d But actually their decision-making can be far more complex than that of the better-off in many ways. They\u2019re not financially illiterate, they\u2019re constantly weighing up choices based on the reality of poverty.<\/em><\/p>\n The decisions poor people make around money are complex. Theirs is a continual process of trade-offs involving the weighing of choices based on the reality of their poverty and a continual battle to stabilize and raise income while reducing vulnerability. The supply-side thinking around product design and delivery fails to reflect this complexity and ignores how the poor use financial services as money management tools. The consumer\u2019s context is defined by an ever-changing panoply of wants, sources of revenue and the available portfolio of financial tools, formal, informal and semi-formal. Instead financial service providers address demand with a limited product range knowing that they are used for a broad array of purposes. Is it no surprise that there are mismatches between the providers\u2019 offers and users\u2019 needs?<\/p>\n The current interface between customer and provider is shaped by a structural bias in which the financial service provider knows best and expects that the customer will do as told. The formal financial services customer tends to be passive and dependent, does not exercise voice and choice and lacks protections. By contrast, in the informal financial sector users speak up and feel freer to let their demands be known. Moreover, DFS require people to leapfrog into digital financial services which combine unfamiliar technology and unwelcoming formal financial services. All present significant barriers to adoption. Surely it is time to revisit this paradigm, recognizing that the increased use of digital financial services means looking beyond the functional attributes of a product to the user\u2019s broader money management strategies and the structural contexts in which they exercise their choices.<\/p>\n Moving forward calls for approaches that generate mutually satisfying results. Each party seeks value and cost advantages. The providers are looking for numbers, volume and value of transactions as potential customers transition into these new systems of financial service delivery. Touch points supported by appropriate provider incentives as well as patience, respect and simplicity of use should be priorities. For users, seeing value in digital financial services will come from learning by doing. Empowered customers will be encouraged to test financial innovations, determine how they can best use them, and share this information with their providers, friends and communities. Lastly, re-enter the regulator whose role may have to be redefined to ensure the new structures work for both sides. These are the essential elements of a new operational framework that promises that customer centrality will become a win-win proposition.<\/p>\n Among her many affiliations,<\/em> Monique Cohen<\/em><\/a> was involved with the Boulder Institute of Microfinance\u2019s training program from its inception through 2016, including teaching courses for over 10 years.<\/em> An earlier version of this post was published<\/a> on the Faculty Corner of the Boulder Institute of Microfinance website, October 21, 2016.<\/em><\/p>\n Image credit: Accion<\/em><\/p>\n Have you read?<\/strong><\/p>\n Client Centricity at Scale: The BRAC Smart Certification Story<\/a><\/p>\n Behavioral Approaches to Product Innovation at the Base of the Pyramid<\/a><\/p>\n Scarcity: Why Having Too Little Means So Much<\/a><\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" If digital financial services are so convenient and affordable, why are uptake and usage rates among individuals with lower incomes so low? Monique Cohen explores the mismatch between products and money management needs. > Posted by\u00a0Monique Cohen This maxim governs much of our financial lives, rich or poor. Yet, we offer financial services to the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"regions":[3308],"series":[],"types":[3123],"client":[],"topics":[44,3181,49,3251,3155],"personas":[],"institutional_partnerships":[],"clients":[],"program_teams":[],"acf":{"authors":false,"types":{"term_id":3123,"name":"Blog Post","slug":"blog-post","term_group":0,"term_taxonomy_id":3123,"taxonomy":"types","description":"","parent":0,"count":2142,"filter":"raw","term_order":"0"},"header":{"header_type":"post_default","post_cover":{"description":""},"post_aligned":{"description":""},"post_default":{"description":""}},"meta_cta":{"download":false,"cta_button_text":"","cta_media":false,"cta_url":"","additional_links":false},"blocks":false,"page_settings":{"":null,"email_sign_up":true,"show_related_content":true,"show_contextual_menu":false,"contextual_menu_cta":null,"replace_global":false,"hide_sticky_share":false,"hide_date_when_featured":false,"is_list_view":false,"premium":false,"preview_image":false,"description":""},"related_content":{"cards":[{"ID":42635,"post_author":"75","post_date":"2021-06-17 16:22:03","post_date_gmt":"2021-06-17 20:22:03","post_content":"A household budget, saving for a business investment, or managing an unforeseen emergency can cause stress in the most adept household, let alone those experiencing the vulnerability and volatility of poverty. Learning to navigate financial systems and products is a long-term endeavor.\r\n\r\nBuilding financial capability \u2014 that is, the knowledge, skills, attitudes, and behaviors needed to make sound financial decisions to support well-being \u2014 can take time and creativity. The ultimate goal is to equip all people with the skills to navigate financial services safely and effectively and allow them to accrue their benefits. For poor and rural communities, this can mean increasing resiliency and reducing exposure to economic shocks, improving income growth and investment, and promoting more sustainable and equitable development. And for women, in particular, the accrued benefits can mean navigating financial choices with confidence, seeing themselves \u2014 and being seen \u2014 as financial clients, and accessing and using technology with ease.\r\n\r\nWhile overall progress has been made in advancing financial inclusion, progress for women continues to lag. Globally, male ownership is likely to be higher than female ownership of accounts<\/a>, with a gap of nearly 7 percent, which has persisted despite the overall rise in account ownership. The gender gap is much worse in some countries, where social norms govern financial access and decision-making<\/a>. For instance, in Pakistan, while account ownership doubled since 2011, most of the growth was driven by accounts owned by men. Similarly, in Ethiopia, account ownership by men increased by roughly twice the size of the increase among women since 2014.\r\n\r\nWe must invest in building women\u2019s financial capability to close this gap and make meaningful progress in women\u2019s access to and usage of financial services. Doing so will require a deeper understanding of the economic and social constraints women face in accessing financial services. Yet existing tools for building financial capability have a mixed track record and there is scarce evidence on which approaches and delivery channels are likely to produce lasting impact.\r\n\r\nThis publication examines how best to share information, build capability, and enable lasting behavior change in a context in which women may have limited say in their own economic choices or require additional support or flexibility to overcome trust and care responsibilities. We examine the characteristics and success of existing approaches to building women\u2019s financial capability and find a gap in programming that sufficiently accounts for women\u2019s preferences, which are largely influenced by gendered social norms.\r\n\r\nReaders of this report will come away with:\r\n Mobile money agents serve as the infrastructural backbone of the mobile money system and are brand ambassadors of digital finance providers. They are often a community\u2019s human touch point<\/a> to mobile money, helping build their communities\u2019 capabilities in mobile money services and products. Agents provide essential services to individuals and businesses in rural and other difficult to reach areas not served by traditional financial institutions, but are limited by their own liquidity. Many agents tend to have a limited amount of cash on hand \u2014 approximately two months\u2019 worth in Kenya, for instance \u2014 to be able to buffer against any emergency or shock, founder and CEO Andrew Matua said in a December 2020 interview.<\/p>\n In serving a network of more than 7,600 mobile money agents across Kenya (and soon Tanzania), the majority of whom run microbusinesses of their own in addition to their mobile money businesses, PesaKit has a deep understanding of the links between financial resilience and financial health, and crucially the interconnectedness between the microentrepreneurs\u2019 household finances and the businesses themselves. PesaKit\u2019s goal is to strengthen their agents\u2019 defenses against emergencies or shocks by building a safety net of Ksh 15,000 to Ksh 60,000 so that agents and their families can sustain themselves for a period of one to four months without any income.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n To accomplish this, after completing a simple onboarding process, PesaKit equips agents with liquidity management tools, which are crucial to agents\u2019 ability to build and maintain trust with their customers. Liquidity management remains a notoriously difficult challenge in operating mobile money agent networks, and as noted by PesaKit founder and CEO Andrew Mutua, liquidity is \u201cactually what they [agents] are in business for. If they have enough float or enough cash, they are able to serve customers. If you don\u2019t have that [as an agent], you are losing income and you are also losing your reputation and the community trust.\u201d<\/p>\n Liquidity management remains a notoriously difficult challenge in operating mobile money agent networks.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n Leveraging data generated through agents\u2019 interactions with PesaKit\u2019s app and predictive analytics, its cash flow insights tool provides agents with the granular information agents need to effectively manage their liquidity, such as how much cash they need, how much float they need, how many customers they might serve, and how much they might earn in commissions.<\/p>\n The biggest challenge for PesaKit has been getting enough robust and consistent data to provide agents with accurate and relevant business insights. While M-Pesa\u2019s continued domination of the Kenyan mobile money market impedes PesaKit\u2019s ability to directly access some mobile money transaction data, PesaKit collects other data through agents\u2019 interaction with its app that reveals key information about agents\u2019 businesses (e.g., demand, business operations, footfall). This information helps agents access small loans that will then generate a credit history and afford them the opportunity to access larger value loans over time.<\/p>\n The pandemic reinforced the important role of PesaKit\u2019s data-driven model, as COVID-19 presented significant challenges to business as usual. At the height of the pandemic, starting in March 2020, the Kenyan government imposed a strict 7 p.m. curfew, which curtailed agents\u2019 hours of operation, restricted the movement of cash, and placed a heavier financial burden on agents overall. PesaKit agents faced increased costs to rebalance their cash flows, as customers were making more deposits than withdrawals, coupled with having to equip their locations with the personal protective equipment, hand sanitizers, cleaning products, and masks they needed to be able to serve their customers safely while observing social distancing guidelines.<\/p>\n To strengthen agents\u2019 social safety net in this time of immense need, PesaKit introduced a 12-month hospital cash insurance cover to provide agents with greater financial security if they tested positive, were quarantined, or were hospitalized due to COVID-19. Again, PesaKit\u2019s proximity to clients enabled them to move quickly and provide appropriate services to help their customers navigate these difficult times.<\/p>\n"},{"acf_fc_layout":"text_block","heading":"reach 52","quick_links":false,"heading_label":"","subheader":"","body":" reach52 seeks to shield low-income, underserved households in rural areas from the disruptive financial burden of out-of-pocket (OOP) health expenditures and protect their livelihoods by providing access to affordable and comprehensive health insurance and healthcare services.<\/p>\n Research by CGAP<\/a> found that those living in low- and middle-income countries pay as much as 60 percent of their health expenditures out of pocket. An unexpected health crisis can force a family to make one of two nearly impossible choices: borrow from an informal moneylender at great expense or sell a household asset to make ends meet. If neither of these are options, families have to suffer poor, if not catastrophic, health outcomes by rationing necessary medical treatment or forgoing it entirely.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Insurance products are meant to help households avoid facing any of those decisions, yet providers often find that insurance is a difficult product to sell to low-income, underserved households<\/a>. Consumers with less experience or comfort with the formal financial system don\u2019t always understand the basics of how insurance works, how it benefits them, what adverse events it protects or mitigates against, and how claims on their policies are paid. Rather than focusing on the intangible nature of insurance and the functional details of their plans and policies, reach52 taps into the emotional and practical benefits of insurance. \u201cNobody really wants to buy insurance,\u201d notes Rich Bryson, Chief Strategy and Marketing Officer at reach52. \u201cBut everybody does want to protect their families and look after them. That is a universal trait and that is absolutely the case in the communities that we\u2019re operating in.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cNobody really wants to buy insurance. But everybody does want to protect their families and look after them.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n reach52 builds on communities\u2019 trust of local leaders, fellow residents, and community-based nongovernmental organizations that are already locally embedded to drive adoption of its insurance products and to scale its solutions more widely. \u201cTrust is absolutely huge,\u201d continues Bryson. \u201cThere can be distrust of external organizations in communities where information is less available and quite a lot of scamming goes on. Partnering with NGOs and individuals in the communities to run the services helps to overcome this. You can then build trust obviously as more people use the service and by sharing positive claims stories, showing how community members have benefited from insurance when they needed it most.\u201d<\/p>\n reach52 recruits and equips Marketplace Area Managers (MAMs) from these aforementioned groups to lead its outreach and onboarding efforts, either in sites directly managed by reach52, or those run by reach52\u2019s on-the-ground partners such as NGOs. MAMs serve as the bridge that connects low-income and rural clients with established insurance providers, using the reach52 marketplace mobile app to help clients find affordable health coverage, as well as prescription and over-the-counter medicines to meet their unique needs.<\/p>\n reach52 drew from a wealth of guidance from its local teams and partners to understand how it could operate safely given travel restrictions and social distancing protocols. With its teams not able to travel, the fintech shifted to focus on its strategy, response, and the development of remote services that could help healthcare workers and the local community. For instance, they developed Facebook Messenger-enabled health chatbot services \u2014 used by more than 100,000 people \u2014 for sharing information on topics such as COVID-19 and its symptoms.<\/p>\n Specifically, reach52 has focused its recent efforts on combatting COVID-19, addressing barriers to healthcare access the pandemic has created for rural and low-income populations, and examining the adverse economic impacts it has had on livelihoods. In partnership with Johnson & Johnson<\/a>, reach52 has provided upskilling and remote learning opportunities for nearly 2,000 of its community health workers in the Philippines and Cambodia through its mediconnect platform. It has also expanded the range of healthcare products and services available through the reach52 marketplace, including reach52\u2019s launch into India<\/a> and Cambodia<\/a>.<\/p>\n reach52 has focused its recent efforts on combatting COVID-19, addressing barriers to healthcare access the pandemic has created for rural and low-income populations<\/p><\/blockquote>\n More broadly, the increased focus on global health and health access issues has accelerated reach52\u2019s partnerships with public and private sector health actors and other key stakeholders, including Pfizer, Biocon, Allianz, and UNICEF Innovation, among others. These new initiatives have ranged from exploring new models of care to address both communicable and chronic health conditions (e.g., dengue fever, diabetes, and hypertension) to new insurance plans and mobile wallet services for low-income communities.<\/p>\n"},{"acf_fc_layout":"text_block","heading":"Conclusion ","quick_links":false,"heading_label":"","subheader":"","body":" reach52 and PesaKit credit their success to placing their end users at the center of everything they do. By focusing on developing solutions that address customer pain points and working to provide additional opportunities for agents to generate income, PesaKit stakes its success on the success of its agents, which it believes will build and maintain customer loyalty and is key to the sustainability of its business over time.<\/p>\n Emphasizing the importance of community and global health, Bryson of reach52 argues that \u201cno one is protected until everyone is protected [\u2026] it is critical that we look at global health and by nature the global economy\u201d as being interconnected in this way.<\/p>\n As the world continues to grapple with the health and economic fallout from the COVID-19 pandemic, the financial needs of customers will continue to evolve. Inclusive fintechs must remain agile and continue adapting to the ever-changing context and evolving needs of their customers. Doing so can help customers manage their immediate needs while also building their financial resilience to mitigate against future crises.<\/p>\n"},{"acf_fc_layout":"logo_wall","title":"Inclusive Fintech 50 Sponsors","heading":"","description":"","logo_cards":[{"logo":"https:\/\/cfi.accion-staging.flywheelsites.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2018\/08\/Screen-Shot-2018-08-31-at-3.31.34-PM.png","company_title":"Metlife Foundation ","meta_label":"","description":"","link_url":"https:\/\/www.metlife.com\/sustainability\/MetLife-sustainability\/MetLife-Foundation\/"},{"logo":"https:\/\/cfi.accion-staging.flywheelsites.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2021\/01\/Visa_2014_logo_detail.jpg","company_title":"Visa ","meta_label":"","description":"","link_url":"https:\/\/usa.visa.com\/about-visa\/philanthropy\/visa-foundation.html"},{"logo":"https:\/\/cfi.accion-staging.flywheelsites.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2021\/01\/blackrock-inc-vector-logo.png","company_title":"BlackRock","meta_label":"","description":"","link_url":"http:\/\/www.blackrock.com"},{"logo":"https:\/\/cfi.accion-staging.flywheelsites.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2019\/04\/CRJOA_Logo_White_Background_RGB-1.png","company_title":"Jersey Overseas Aid and Comic Relief","meta_label":"","description":"","link_url":"https:\/\/www.comicrelief.com\/partners\/jersey-overseas-aid\/"},{"logo":"https:\/\/cfi.accion-staging.flywheelsites.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2018\/09\/Accion.jpg","company_title":"Accion ","meta_label":"","description":"","link_url":"https:\/\/accion.org"},{"logo":"https:\/\/cfi.accion-staging.flywheelsites.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2018\/08\/ifc_vertical_logo.jpg","company_title":"IFC","meta_label":"","description":"","link_url":"http:\/\/www.ifc.org"}]}],"page_settings":{"":null,"email_sign_up":true,"show_related_content":true,"show_contextual_menu":false,"contextual_menu_cta":null,"replace_global":false,"hide_sticky_share":false,"hide_date_when_featured":false,"is_list_view":false,"premium":false,"preview_image":false,"description":""}},"url":"agility-breeds-resilience-a-tale-of-two-fintechs-innovating-in-the-face-of-a-pandemic"},{"ID":36930,"post_author":"75","post_date":"2019-09-25 17:48:25","post_date_gmt":"2019-09-25 21:48:25","post_content":"Digital credit has emerged as a new and profitable service offering that has great potential to increase financial inclusion. Yet, if not carefully managed, digital credit also runs the risk of excluding, over-charging, and over-extending customers.\r\n\r\nSeven years since the first digital credit product launched, the market in Kenya has grown exponentially and hosts a diverse ecosystem with more than 50 supply-side actors. The phenomenal expansion of digital credit in Kenya serves as a test-bed for the product and offers lessons for digital credit suppliers and regulators around the world.\r\n\r\nSPTF and the Smart Campaign commissioned MicroSave Consulting (MSC) to study the dynamics of the digital credit sector on both demand and supply sides. The output of the study was a comprehensive report on the current state of digital credit in Kenya<\/a>. It looked at the evolving challenges in digital credit and made recommendations for a more responsible and customer-centric delivery of the product.\r\n\r\nWith participation from Smart Campaign Senior Director Alexandra Rizzi, this webinar:\r\n\r\n \t
Digital lenders do not measure the capacity of someone to repay, but their willingness to repay and these are drastically different concepts.<\/blockquote>\r\nFor example, I might score very well on a digital risk assessment. My geo-trace shows I go to work every day, my call log shows I call my mom regularly, and my browsing history shows I do not engage in sports bets. These measurements indicate I am a responsible citizen who complies with her duties, suggesting that I have a high willingness to repay a loan. However, I might have astronomical medical expenses that the digital lender is unable to detect. Or I might be sending significant remittances to my family. Both of these relate to my repayment capacity and are measures that digital lending apps tend to ignore in favor of automated decision-making based on more readily available data.\r\n\r\nBy comparison, traditional banks run thorough credit risk assessments, sometimes so thorough that they are slow and expensive. These banks have credit committees and risk analysis departments that challenge relationship managers on the loan proposals they present. The result is that most people granted a loan have the means to pay it back. This method excludes the majority of the world\u2019s population from the financial system, however, it also ensures that most people who are granted a consumer loan actually have the capacity to repay.\r\n\r\nSo where do we draw the line? How do we expand access to credit to low-income people and informal workers and also protect them from default? How can we measure their capacity to repay in a cheap, digital, and rapid manner? Should we prohibit alternative, digital, phone-based metrics that only assess someone\u2019s willingness to repay?\r\n
A Possible Solution<\/h2>\r\nThe answer could be a measure in between. One idea is that the Central Bank of Kenya could only grant a license to digital lenders that incorporate the borrower\u2019s capacity to repay in their credit assessment algorithms. This means, finding a way to measure, prove and integrate the person\u2019s real income and expenses. Another option could be asking lenders to integrate proxies for repayment capacity. For example, mobile money records could be matched with the borrower's geolocation to determine where and why they are being paid and predict how stable his or her income is. Coupled with strong data protection measures, this and similar metrics could help curb the high default rate and loan-stacking among digital borrowers in Kenya without causing financial exclusion.\r\n\r\nFurther, as suggested in a publication produced by CFI<\/a>, the Central Bank of Kenya should withdraw a digital lender\u2019s license upon surpassing a threshold percentage of non-performing loans as a share of the total loan portfolio. This would force the lenders to improve their algorithms and creatively design more capacity-measuring metrics. And finally, the CBK should explicitly require licensed digital lenders to cross-check an individual\u2019s loan performance with each other before issuing further credit to prevent loan-stacking. Although the Digital Lenders Association of Kenya (DLAK) advocates for digital lenders to be able to receive and submit borrower information to credit bureaus, this practice has not addressed loan stacking in the past and only served to blacklist millions of borrowers for small amounts. Therefore, digital lenders should be allowed to view and report outstanding loans, yet with very limited power to blacklist a late borrower.\r\n
The CBK should explicitly require licensed digital lenders to cross-check an individual\u2019s loan performance with each other before issuing further credit to prevent loan-stacking.<\/blockquote>\r\nKenya cannot go back to the old bank-driven model which financially excluded most of the population, yet Kenyans cannot keep paying the price for the financial experimentation of tech startups. Digital credit should be responsible, affordable, and inclusive. With this new bill, the Central Bank of Kenya is getting closer to achieving it. However, the root cause of the problem is the evaluation algorithm and the business model that stems from it. Without addressing this, little will change for Kenyan borrowers.","post_title":"Digital Lending in Kenya: Willingness vs. Capacity to Repay","post_excerpt":"","post_status":"publish","comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","post_password":"","post_name":"digital-lending-in-kenya-willingness-vs-capacity-to-repay","to_ping":"","pinged":"","post_modified":"2021-06-09 16:42:25","post_modified_gmt":"2021-06-09 20:42:25","post_content_filtered":"","post_parent":0,"guid":"https:\/\/content.centerforfinancialinclusion.org\/?p=42599","menu_order":0,"post_type":"post","post_mime_type":"","comment_count":"0","filter":"raw","featured_image":"https:\/\/cfi.accion-staging.flywheelsites.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2021\/06\/Kenyan-woman-thinking-holding-a-white-phone-blue-shirt-capacity-willingess-to-repay.jpg","acf":{"types":{"term_id":3123,"name":"Blog Post","slug":"blog-post","term_group":0,"term_taxonomy_id":3123,"taxonomy":"types","description":"","parent":0,"count":2142,"filter":"raw","term_order":"0"},"header":{"header_type":"post_aligned","post_cover":{"description":""},"post_aligned":{"description":"Capacity needs to be much more of a factor in high-tech decision-making about who gets a loan. How can this be done? "},"post_default":{"description":"Capacity needs to be much more of a factor in high-tech decision-making about who gets a loan. How can this be done? "}},"authors":[{"ID":42603,"post_author":"75","post_date":"2021-06-09 16:21:46","post_date_gmt":"2021-06-09 20:21:46","post_content":"","post_title":"Maria Gabriela Coloma Ponce de Leon","post_excerpt":"","post_status":"publish","comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","post_password":"","post_name":"maria-gabriela-coloma-ponce-de-leon","to_ping":"","pinged":"","post_modified":"2021-06-09 17:11:52","post_modified_gmt":"2021-06-09 21:11:52","post_content_filtered":"","post_parent":0,"guid":"https:\/\/content.centerforfinancialinclusion.org\/?post_type=people&p=42603","menu_order":0,"post_type":"people","post_mime_type":"","comment_count":"0","filter":"raw"}],"meta_cta":{"download":false,"cta_button_text":"","cta_media":false,"cta_url":"","additional_links":false},"blocks":false,"page_settings":{"":null,"email_sign_up":true,"show_related_content":true,"show_contextual_menu":false,"contextual_menu_cta":null,"replace_global":false,"hide_sticky_share":false,"hide_date_when_featured":false,"is_list_view":false,"premium":false,"preview_image":false,"description":""}},"url":"digital-lending-in-kenya-willingness-vs-capacity-to-repay"},{"ID":41199,"post_author":"75","post_date":"2021-01-26 18:17:11","post_date_gmt":"2021-01-26 22:17:11","post_content":"The severe economic impacts of COVID-19 on low-income households and small businesses have underscored the need for innovative solutions that can build greater financial resilience. Findings from surveys of MSMEs<\/a> conducted by the Center for Financial Inclusion (CFI) show that since COVID-19 struck, many small businesses in Indonesia, Colombia, and Nigeria have either had to close or found their profits significantly decreased. At the same time, the pandemic has provided opportunities for inclusive fintechs to leverage their agility and adaptability<\/a> to strengthen and support the financial resilience of low-income, financially underserved customers.\r\n\r\nFinancial resilience is the ability to mitigate, adapt to, and recover from shocks and stresses in a manner that reduces chronic vulnerability and facilitates inclusive growth. Individuals must deftly navigate a delicate balancing act to stay afloat and may be thrown off course by a whole host of shocks, ranging from unexpected health crises to weather-related disasters that can disrupt otherwise appropriate financial plans. The nuances associated with financial resilience can complicate the financial service industry\u2019s ability to develop and design comprehensive solutions for low-income customers.\r\n
PesaKit and reach52, two winners of the 2020 Inclusive Fintech 50, have responded to the extraordinary challenges posed by the COVID-19 pandemic by continuing to innovate to meet their customers\u2019 needs.<\/blockquote>\r\nPesaKit and reach52, two winners of the 2020 Inclusive Fintech 50<\/a> -- a competition founded by MetLife Foundation and Visa, with support from Accion and IFC, and additional funding from BlackRock and Jersey Overseas Aid & Comic Relief -- have responded to the extraordinary challenges posed by the COVID-19 pandemic by continuing to innovate to meet their customers\u2019 needs. In this paper, we share insights on how these two fintechs have adapted to a challenging economic landscape to serve as early examples of how fintechs have leveraged their agility and innovation during crisis. These findings build on the 2020 Inclusive Fintech 50 white paper<\/a> that draws on the data submitted by the 2020 cohort of applicants and highlights how fintechs are continuing to advance financial inclusion and resilience for the estimated 3 billion financially underserved people worldwide.","post_title":"Agility Breeds Resilience: A Tale of Two Fintechs Innovating in the Face of a Pandemic","post_excerpt":"","post_status":"publish","comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","post_password":"","post_name":"agility-breeds-resilience-a-tale-of-two-fintechs-innovating-in-the-face-of-a-pandemic","to_ping":"","pinged":"","post_modified":"2021-01-28 14:25:27","post_modified_gmt":"2021-01-28 18:25:27","post_content_filtered":"","post_parent":0,"guid":"https:\/\/content.centerforfinancialinclusion.org\/?p=41199","menu_order":0,"post_type":"post","post_mime_type":"","comment_count":"0","filter":"raw","featured_image":"https:\/\/cfi.accion-staging.flywheelsites.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2021\/01\/two-african-women-looking-at-phone-NK.png","acf":{"types":{"term_id":29,"name":"Brief","slug":"brief","term_group":0,"term_taxonomy_id":29,"taxonomy":"types","description":"","parent":0,"count":14,"filter":"raw","term_order":"0"},"header":{"header_type":"post_cover","post_cover":{"description":""},"post_aligned":{"description":""},"post_default":{"description":""}},"authors":[{"ID":26368,"post_author":"1","post_date":"2018-08-20 13:50:32","post_date_gmt":"2018-08-20 13:50:32","post_content":"","post_title":"Tess Johnson","post_excerpt":"","post_status":"publish","comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","post_password":"","post_name":"tess-johnson","to_ping":"","pinged":"","post_modified":"2021-03-31 16:07:45","post_modified_gmt":"2021-03-31 20:07:45","post_content_filtered":"","post_parent":0,"guid":"http:\/\/cfi.accion.flywheelsites.com\/people\/tess-johnson\/","menu_order":0,"post_type":"people","post_mime_type":"","comment_count":"0","filter":"raw"}],"meta_cta":{"download":false,"cta_button_text":"","cta_media":false,"cta_url":"","additional_links":false},"blocks":[{"acf_fc_layout":"text_block","heading":"PesaKit","quick_links":false,"heading_label":"","subheader":"","body":"
Providing a Lifeline to Mobile Money Agents<\/h2>\n
Protecting Agents from the Pandemic\u2019s Worst Economic Impacts<\/h3>\n
Leveraging Community Trust to Expand Access to Healthcare<\/h2>\n
Expanding Service Offerings and Forging New Partnerships<\/h2>\n
Beyond COVID<\/h2>\n
\r\n \t