Ujjivan - Providing Financial Services to the Poor

Bank savings accounts opened for the urban poor
Large financial inclusion camp held for urban poor customers at Magadi Road branch in Bangalore

Magadi Road branch, on the outskirts of Bangalore lies on the road to Nelamangala, one of city’s garbage landfill areas, far from the manicured streets of central and south Bangalore where prosperity is obvious. But a transformation is quietly taking place in this locality.

In January, Ujjivan and Corporation Bank conducted a Free Savings Account camp for customers at the Magadi Road Branch in Bangalore. Nearly thousand women attended the camp where they were helped in opening no-frills savings accounts with the bank.

As on date, over 1200 customers at the branch have opened savings accounts.

Men, women and children crowded around the field officers who were taking client’s photos, scanning their fingerprint and typing in information from identity papers.

The opening and activation of a ‘No-frills’ account occurs in 3 stages

1) Field promotion of No-frills: training the customers on the basic concepts of a no-frills account
2) Savings a/c form filled by the customer and submitted to bank
3) After a/c opening, capture of customer fingerprint on the biometric smartcard.

In parallel, the Business Correspondent (BC)/Bank agent is selected and introduced to the customers at the fingerprint camp. An average BC is expected to serve 500 customer accounts in his/her area.

To ensure maximum impact and timely execution of the above steps, Ujjivan branch staff proactively worked on the various stages. Field staff and the Corporation Bank Manager actively promoted/advertised and trained the customers on basic concepts of the no-frills account at the centre meetings while Ujjivan’s Customer Relationship Staff (CRS) filled up customer forms and also recommended suitable candidates as Business Correspondents to the bank. The entire branch team coordinated the conducting of the fingerprint camp at Ujjivan’s branch premises.

Around 800 customers attended the camp during the fingerprinting process (over a period of 5 days). For the remaining customers, Ujjivan CRSs made door-to-door visits along with the Corporation Bank manager.

The impact of the model will depend on the usage of ‘No-frills’ accounts by the customers. If successful, this will be the first urban-based ‘No-frills’ savings initiative undertaken through the synergies among 3 parties – Bank, Technology/BC partner and an MFI.