Bachelor Thesis

Bachelors Thesis Project

Design of a Microfinance based mobile interface

Department Of Design
Indian Institute of Technology Guwahati

S.Nitish Sivaramakrishnan
06020517

Guide: Prof. Pradeep Yammiyavar
Department Of Design,
IIT Guwahati

Bachelor Thesis Presentation

Contents

• Objective
• Timeline
• Introduction
• Design Methodology
• Literature Review
• Data Collection and Field Study
• Research Conclusions and Insights
• Conceptual Design
• Final Prototype
• Conclusions
• Acknowledgements


Objective

• Aim :
Design of a microfinance based mobile interface for the
Microfinance Credit officer to easily tackle Microfinance Activities
and Transactions

• For doing the various microfinance activities
 Creating New records
 Locating new groups
 Saving transactions
 Reporting collections and transactions


Timeline

Oct - Nov Feb - Mar Apr
Final application
Preparation of prototypes
Case1: PEACE development on
and wireframes
Case2: Grameen Bank Netbeans JAVA

Problem
and Documenta
Mockup First Phase
Literature Case Study Application User Final tion and
and Application
Study Analysis Area Testing Prototyping Demonstrat
Prototyping Design
identificatio ion
n

Study of Microfinance
Mobile Application
Development Field study at Prototype based on
Nightingale and visual and aesthetic
Grameen Sahara guidelines
Aug- Sept
Dec- Jan


Introduction
• What is Micro-Finance ?
• The typical micro finance clients :
 Low-income persons
 Micro finance clients are typically self-employed, often household-based
entrepreneurs.

• In rural areas,
 Small farmers and
 Food processing and petty trade.

• In urban areas,
 Shopkeepers, service providers, artisans, street vendors, etc.

• The obstacles - microfinance industry
 Difficulty in maintaining sustainability
 Poor regulation and supervision of deposit-taking MFIs
 Few MFIs that mobilize savings
 Limited management capacity in MFIs


Design Process


“ Generating ideas on the project, Literature Study
What are the current demands and trends , how
are things managed, details about Microfinance
process ”

•What is Microfinance?
•Who are the people
involved?
•How it functions?
•How can Mobile ICT
bring about a positive
change?

“ Answering Key questions that were raised during
the initial stage. Generating ideas, identifying and
understanding the users. Defining the context of
product usage”

Field Research at
•Nightingale Charitable
Society, Chandmari, Guwahati
•Grameen Sahara, Choaigaon,
Guwahati

“ The ideas and insights from the design research
put into discussions, sketches and mockups.
Defining scenarios and creating personas go hand
in hand ”

•Brain Storming
•Sketches
•Defining Scenarios
•Creating Personas
•Mockups
•Task Flows

“ Designing through iterations helps in evolving
designs. User testing enables the designer to
validate, test and evolve the design on real
feedback”

•Iterative design
•Architecture Diagrams
•Task Flows
•Wireframes
•Prototyping
•User Testing

Design Prototype Test

“ Creating the Mobile Interface using principles of
usability and interactions. Visual Design of the UI
includes aspects such as, layout, information design
and animation”

“ Using JAVA J2ME technology to create the
prototype on a mobile phone and handling the
compatibility issues with phone resolutions”

Data Collection and Field Study

Quantitative Data:
Nature of Data Number
• Photographs 30
• Videos 11
• Interviews 6
• Process Studies 3
• Documents and forms 17

Qualitative data:
• Process understanding
• Client and Credit officer interaction
• Credit officer work schedule
• Statistics and information about various
products and processes


Literature Review

Took case studies from:
• Grameen Bank
• PEACE

Purpose:
• Understanding the purpose of the activity
• People involved in the process
• Technological Drawbacks
• Other nuances


Field Study : CML

• Funded by Tata Social Welfare trust, dedicated to MF
research
• Also organises training programmes, workshops and
seminars
• Interview excerpts with Mr. Partho Patwari:
 Microfinance has a personal touch
 Mobile connectivity in transactions
 Lesser data collected presently, and 95% on paper
 Household rather than individual
 Issues of trustworthiness, monitoring activity and accountability


Field Study : Nightingale Charitable Society

• Loan repayment process:
• Repayments are collected from group leaders
• A receipt is given to the client and a counter is kept
with CO
• CO goes over to Branch Office to transfer data to the
daily collection register
• CO also makes entry on the loan card to be approved
by the branch manager
• Day of month system, intra-group compensation

• CO fact file:
• Receipt book, a personal (ruled by hand) record book
• Has a jurisdiction
• Possesses a mobile phone, does field work from
0930hrs onwards


Field Study : Nightingale Charitable Society


Field Study : Grameen Sahara

Microfinance Credit officer:
• Communicate to the client about the loan sanction and
loan amount
• Collect required documents Photo ID (ration card or voter
ID card)
• Completion of loan documents (DPN ,Loan Agreement )
• Prepare Loan Passbook
• Thorough check of documentation done
• Upfront charges to collected :loan processing fee,
membership fee, and risky fund/insurance fee during
disbursement
• Issue receipt against each cash collection


Research Conclusions and Insights

• The Microfinance credit officer forms the joint liability groups .
• Completes the formalities and documentation for each group
• He communicates the group details to the branch office and the
branch manager.
• The microfinance credit officer visits the households and client
groups as per schedule that he prepares the previous day.
• The credit officer maintains records in his personal hand book and
carries a receipt book on his field visits.
• The Credit officer visits every group in intervals of 20 to 30 minutes.
• The credit officer has a reasonably high end mobile phone enough
to run applications made on flash and J2ME.


Final Designs
Schedule Application:
•Application has 4 different modules
•The 1st application: Daily Schedule
•Displays List of clients to be visited : group code, time, group
leader name are displayed
•Credit officer enters : Principal, Interest and receipt number
•Confirmation message displayed
•Message sent to the Branch Office


Final Designs
Modify Group:
•The 2nd application: Modify Group
•Displays List of all clients : group code, time, group leader name
are displayed
•Credit officer enters/changes field entries : Group code, Group
Leader, Collection date, Collection time, Interest Principal, Last
collection, Disbursement date, Installment number
•Client details modified successfully


Final Designs
Add New Group:
•The 3rd application: Add New Group
•Displays empty form for data entry: group code, group leader name
collection date, collection time, disbursement date, Interest,
Principal.
•Credit officer enters the data:
•A new group successfully created


Final Designs
Area Map Application :
•The 4th application: Area Map
•Displays the area map application , options : zoom in , zoom out,
search


“ Evaluation of the product based on its functioning
features, compatibility on different resolutions -
Product Demonstration ”

“ Product Demonstration ”

Discussions and Conclusions
• The final working prototype of the application is functional and is packaged as a
deliverable JAVA application. The application would be used by the microfinance
credit officers in the field and also the mobile application is compatible on many
types of mobile platforms ranging from a touch phone to a low-end mobile phone.

• For a future reference the application could have more number of modules and
packages that can be installed inside the application as utility tools for the Credit
officer as the need arises. As and when the microfinance institution has available
finances it could deploy hand held computers and devices for data entry that can
have these details incorporated in them.

• The impact of the project will render the job of the Credit officer easy and this
could indirectly help the microfinance institutions cover more clients over the
process and would reduce the record maintenance cost at all levels.

• The application is successful in managing the sustainability and outreach issues.


Acknowledgements

• I would like to express deep gratitude to my guide Prof. Pradeep Yammiyavar for
his guidance, encouragement and gracious support throughout the course of my
work, for his expertise in the field that motivated me to work in this area and for
his faith in me at every stage of this research.

• I would like to thank Mr.Partho Patwari, Program coordinator, Centre for
Microfinance and Livelihood. I am grateful to the Microfinance institutions
Nightingale Charitable Society – Microfinance, Guwahati and Grameen Sahara,
Guwahati for providing necessary support and permissions to conduct field
studies.

• I would like to thank all the students and staff of Department of Design for their
help in the whole process leading to the conceptualization of the project. In
particular I would like to thank G.Venkateshwaran and Iyer Ganesh Vishwanathan
for their support in this project.


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