This is part of a series of blog posts we are doing based on new research about business correspondents (agents) in India.   The India research was one part of a three-country study (along with Brazil and Kenya).

A notable difference in the role of banking agents (also called Customer Service Providers or CSPs) in India compared to other countries is that the agents are responsible for customer acquisition in addition to processing transactions.

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Karuna Krishnaswamy works with the CGAP Technology Program.

One day each way – costing nearly US$10 total is what some Maldivians who have a bank account have to pay in order to exchange cash.   The archipelago of the Maldives is about 1,600 kilometers to the south of Mumbai. I was there recently – not for a vacation but to begin work on a nationally-representative survey of the 300,000 people who live there. Working with our partners, we want to know how people use banking services: What are the usage patterns, transaction costs, levels of mobile network penetration?

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