How mobile is facilitating financial inclusion at the grassroots level
The whole world is moving towards paper less currency – be it digital finance or cryptocurrency. The evolving technology, apps and better user experience have grown the audience of digital finance. Every month, new people are joining the crowd of Online Payment options. Brands make the most of its use through this ease of payment. With better mobile access in the deeper parts of India, financial inclusion is making its way there. The panel discussion on ‘Mobile Medium: Route to Financial Inclusion’ at the 5th edition of MOBEXX 2021 focus on how mobile tech is helping more and more people go cashless. Moderated by Ashish Tiwari, Chief Marketing and Digital Officer, Future Generali, the esteemed panellists included:
Aksha Sachdev, Associate Director – User Experience Strategy, Fractal Ink Design Consultancy
Anurag Garg, Founder and CEO, Nivesh.com
Apurva Chaudhari, SVP - Head - Online Business & Digital Marketing, Motilal Oswal Financial Inclusion
Kunal Bhardwaj, Senior Director - Marketing at Upstox
Ashish Tiwari observed how technology has been evolving and has reached deeper parts of the country today. He also noted the evolution in payment methods over the years.
Commenting on the role of financial inclusion and how India is affected by this, Anurag Garg said, “Mobile has played a big role in promoting financial inclusion in the country, the reason being simple, because the desktop was not really accessible to the masses, whereas the mobile is much cheaper to own, easy to operate and carry along. To promote financial inclusion, it is very important that when you want to do a transaction, the technology should be handy and that way mobile plays a big role, because you could use it on the go.”
Adding to that Aksha Sachdev said, “I want to look at the other side of the user in the same situation – the merchant. The merchant is one of the important reasons why we are able to pay conveniently, because it is these small merchants across our country who have decided to be on the UPI platform. They serve as a great example of lowest effort entry point that we have been able to provide to the users who are not digitally savvy. Just a QR code sticker on the storefront was enough for the user to come on board this journey with us.”
Elaborating on what brings more inclusion other than UPI, Apurva Chaudhari noted, “UPI has certainly enabled the companies and the brands, and even the audience, to transact flawlessly. From our perspective in the investment space, the exponential growth which you have seen in the booking and investment space has actually coincided with the whole data revolution which took place post 2016. The client acquisition has been huge, which were around 25 million accounts at the industry level and today, we are over 85 million accounts and still acquiring at the rate of local point 2.5 million accounts per month.”
Kunal Bhardwaj added here, “For the last decade I’ve worked primarily in companies that are driven by mobile – from ByteDance to my own start-up in gaming. If I have to break it down at the base level and define what a mobile phone does for either a business or a consumer, it is to offer convenience. Now, if I layer that convenience with trust, especially important in financial transactions, and give him solutions which he would generally have to travel to a location, go through several number of forms, speak to at least 6-7 people and spend close to or minimum 30 minutes, then I think mobile is the only answer to all the problems. The numbers that Upstox is getting, especially from non-metros and women, are insane, because people are realising that the mobile phone is something that’s there with them all the time, with the assurances built in that this is a viable and feasible form of conducting any and all your financial transactions.”
This is an edited excerpt. For the complete conversation watch below:
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