Financial inclusion is about access to financial products — both savings and borrowings. It is also about safe, easy and low-cost access to a cash-flow management system.

About the financial inclusion

It includes a payment system that allows you to move money around safely and at a low cost.

Financial inclusion has been an important developmental agenda for India.

Though financial inclusion is ‘necessary’, it is definitely not a ‘sufficient’ condition for economic growth.

It’s like what water does to stimulate germination; but for healthy growth of a seedling, fertile soil, air and Lack of even one of these factors will lead to stunted growth.

Fresh Approach to Financial Inclusion of Yes Bank

A watershed period

The current decade is the watershed period for financial inclusion in India as it marks a paradigm shift in the approaches of banks and financial institutional.

Currently, India’s banking network comprises of 1.15 lakh branches and an ATM network of 1.6 lakh.

Specific solutions

The success of financial inclusion depends largely on developing products/solutions that directly address those specific needs.

The financially excluded consumers have certain unique characteristics such as low financial literacy, low and cyclical income, minimal collateral, lack of credit history, absence of formal and verifiable identity, illiteracy.

These need to be taken care of while designing products and services for them

3. Trust and scale

Research across the globe proves that for a digital inclusion initiative to be successful, there are two major critical factors; building trust and breaking the sub-scale trap.

The latter has again two subcomponents — increasing network participants and increasing network ‘touch-points’.