Next –Gen Financial Services-Automation in commerce

PURSUING A WORLD OF MOBILE WALLETS * With India embracing internet banking, the dreams of financial inclusion has gone bolder .Mobile banking is set to become the new face of Indian commerce. * It is hoped that very soon a cell phone will allow you to show proof of identity and act as a store of money. * At some point, every cell phone user has received a message while withdrawing money from ATM or used the phone to book movie tickets. * There is lot more waiting to happen like mobile can be used to pay insurance premium and to pay grocer’s bill. * Government is viewing this revolution to provide financial inclusion at a macro level. * Mobile banking is expected to bring this vibrant dream right down to masses.
The INDIAN STORY * India has found a confluence of favorable factors such as large mobile user base along with commenced Aadhaar project. * The government intends to make cash payments directly into the accounts of aadhaar beneficiaries. * So to serve all these account holders there is enough scope for intermediaries to come up with solutions and tools to educate these new users. * Services in local languages and offering varied conveniences may lead to early adoption of m-commerce.
M-Commerce Efficiency * There is much efficiency to be earned by converting a cash economy into an electronic economy. * Huge costs are involved in the back-end of a cash economy. Example-A customer makes his premium payment to an advisor in a village, who puts this money in the branch, which hands it over to the bank and thus a long value chain involved. * Now in electronic economy costs will reduce. Example-A customer hands over cash to advisor and advisor makes a mobile payment through (USSD) Unstructured Supplementary Service Data mechanism. When the advisor accepts the cash he will not down UID or Mobile number of customer, so customer can receive confirmation via SMS. * At the higher -end of the spectrum, table offers much more security and higher comfort in terms of layers that can be provided and therefore, adoption is imminent.
Secure Foundations * With secure and robust systems, financial companies will have little fear of mobile banking. With time this sentiment will be transmitted to the customers. * Interbank Mobile Payment System (IMPS) that facilitates the customer of one bank to send money to the customer of another time is already in place. * This system has already 3o banks as members and 14 million customers. * Merchant payment system on IMPS platform was kicked off recently.
The Opportunities * At present 30% insurance premium is paid in cash through intermediaries. Transferring this electronically means huge savings. * Untapped consumers in the market i.e. those persons who have mobile but still hesitant to use its services. * Encouragement through KYC norms for the end user would make a big change in facilitating m-commerce for the masses. * There is insurance repository that is going to make insurance business fairly electronic.