commute, could be longer. In the event of money not getting credited, the recipients would have to come again and end up losing the time they invested on that given day altogether.
Solutions to consider The local economy in rural and tribal settings has a high frequency of financial and product exchange, lively local markets, with a large number of stakeholders actively transacting amongst each other. Creating payment access points at these commercial “hotspots” can greatly increase the relevance and value of these benefits in people’s lives.
Cash management In most non-tribal villages, the MC would drop the cash off at the CSP’s village/place of payment. In tribal areas, owing to greater geographical expanse and access limitations, the CSPs often have to travel to the mandal headquarters to take cash from the MC. Most CSPs spoke about the security risk that they have to shoulder while transporting the money back to the village and onwards.
On the technology side, making more robust PoT terminals in terms of longer lasting power (through either solar energy or higher capacity batteries) and increasing data storage capacity can increase the efficiency of payments and mitigate incidence of manual payments. For a community that has been largely un-serviced by mainstream institutions, payment accounts present an opportunity for additional products such as insurance or simple deposit schemes to be routed to them. The tribal communities have a high level of social cohesion and commensurate trust amongst each other. Payment benefits can therefore be used to facilitate SHG savings and subsequent access to bank linkages. Instructions from a recipient can trigger a small sum of money to be transferred virtually from an individual payment account into a designated SHG account.
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