Riding the M-PESA Rails: Advantages & Disadvantages

• by Mukesh Sadana, George Mugweru, Joyce Murithi, David Cracknell and Graham Wright
• May 11, 2011
• 1 min
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This Note examines if, how and where financial institutions are realising the potential of M-PESA to make their systems more efficient and their products more accessible.

By riding on M-PESA rails, most banks, MFIs and Deposit Taking Microfinance Programs (DTMs) are looking for cost reduction, increased staff efficiency and convenience of customers, which ultimately should lead to more deposits/transactions. This Note examines if, how and where financial institutions are realising the potential of M-PESA to make their systems more efficient and their products more accessible. It concludes that financial institutions that have agreements with M-PESA are not heavily promoting the opportunity, despite the potential benefits. They are aware of the issues faced by customers as well as the back-end challenges of reconciliation and so on, and are thus cautious about large-scale rollout.