Tanzania Post Bank (TPB) has been at the forefront of financial inclusion in Tanzania. 81% of the adult population (age 15+) does not have a bank account and 27% of the adult population are completely financially excluded. In the last 5 years, TPB Bank has brought 500,000 previously financially excluded Tanzanians into the financial system. In order to promote savings to all members of the population, TPB has partnered with VICOBAs, VSLAs and Informal Groups. TPB has also implemented differing programs and services to reach the rural population such as Mobile and Agency Banking.
VICOBAs or Village Community Banks aim to reduce poverty by providing saving and credit services, facilitates the funding for the startup of income generating activities in the community, and provide credit to fund expenses such as their children’s education. VICOBA groups have been successful among women and have facilitated economic emancipation and empowerment of many women in the area.
VSLAs or Village Savings and Loan Associations are groups in targeted communities to provide sustainable and profitable microfinance services – especially in remote places with no access to formal financial services. These are safe-managed groups and they provide members with a safe place to save their money, acquire small loans, and obtain emergency insurance. Women represents approximately 70 percent of the population. TPB initiated this scheme to build a relationship with these groups via NGOs as the gateway.
Lastly TPB created a group product for groups composed of up to 5 members (Informal Groups) who do savings and keep their money at home or under their pillow. This scheme allows the groups to save their money with no cost, no ledge fee, and no withdrawal fee. All 4 – TPB, VICOBA, VSLA and Informal Groups have seen increases in their deposits. The bank’s deposit has grown by 6%, VICOBA by 16%, VSLA by 44%, and Informal Groups by 96%.
TPB offers free mobile banking transactions to all group clients in VICOBAs, VSLAs and other set groups. This service is provided to encourage rural clients to use bank accounts through agency banking. This service helps to reach the financially excluded as there are more Mobile accounts than financial accounts. In 2013, there were 31.5 million Mobile accounts and 11 million were active.
TPB has successfully promoted savings because of several key factors:
• Importance of information dissemination and knowledge sharing
• Importance of offering a product with low or no fee, no charge
• Importance of adapting products to the context: for example, working with groups
• Need of partnerships to enable service complementary for a maximized adaption to the demand
• Advantage of leveraging several changes and device options to fit different client segmentations
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