The early experience with branchless banking

Branchless banking has great potential to extend the distribution of financial services to poor people who are not reached by traditional bank branch networks; it lowers the cost of delivery, including costs both to banks of building and maintaining a delivery channel and to customers of accessing services. This paper reviews seven key observations, Consultative Group to Assist the Poorest (CGAP) has drawn from its advisory work and research on branchless banking and, particularly, from its support of branchless banking projects around the world over the past year. Each element and player in the branchless banking delivery chain, including customers, financial service providers, agents, products, and technology platforms, is addressed. Most of the observations apply equally to the use of mobile phones to handle remote transactions (or mobile banking) and card based branchless banking networks. However, lessons from mobile banking are emphasized because of its newness relative to card-based networks.