Lead-Generation Product for CUs

By Joyce Moed, Reporter

MADISON, Wis.–World Council of Credit Unions teamed with one of Mexico’s largest credit unions–Caja Morelia Valladolid in Morelia, Mexico–in a pilot project utilizing PDAs to perform financial transactions during field members to their visits.

The project has been so successful that it expanded to include Caja Yanga, in Veracruz, Mexico.
This project has been selected as a best practice by Credit Union Journal for using PDAs to increase efficiency and security on delivering financial services to rural Mexico.

“In Mexico, our objective is working with the credit unions and helping them with their outreach in rural areas,” said Tiffany Litscher, program manager for WOCCU.

In rural areas of Mexico, there is not enough population density or infrastructure to support branch offices or ATMs, but cellular phone signals extend into the areas, which make PDA use often the only way to provide CU services to these members.

The PDAs allow for CU field officers to transmit account data via cellular phone towers to the CU’s central database in real time during visits to members in remote rural communities.

“A credit union staff person goes out there monthly,” Litscher said.  “People who live out there–a lot have never had access to a formal financial institution. We were looking for ways to gain trust, earn credibility, increase convenience. A lot of schemes go on in these countries, so there is little trust. There’s a lot of skepticism. The PDAs were the way to help us build trust and credibility. The PDA allows us to go into the community and go into the current central system to show the member their balance from the credit unions, and a portable printer to show proof of the transaction immediately. This has further helped the trust factor. It’s also helped us to provide a better service to our members. We can also do small loans right away.”

Before the PDAs, credit union representatives had to record all the transactions with pen and paper, and then bring the proof to the members of the transaction when they came back at the next visit.

The new technology was introduced in November 2008, and reduces the risk of error experienced in manual record keeping on field visits, and helps provide faster, more secure service, which builds member trust. The technology is a new addition to the semilla coopertiva (cooperative seed) rural outreach program WOCCU pioneered in the states of Michoacan, where Morelia is located, and Veracruz five years ago thanks to funding from the Mexican Ministry of Agriculture, Livestock, Rural Development, Fishing and Food. Through semilla cooperativa, credit unions train rural field officers from the area to regularly provide CU services to communities up to 19 miles from branch offices. This service approach involves attracting new members, extending financial education, approving small loan applications, and bringing credit, savings and remittance services directly to people living in remote rural areas.

Early returns indicate PDA usage has helped drive overall growth of the semilla cooperative program for Caja Morelia Valladolid, which is what encouraged WOCCU to expand the program in March 2009 to Caha Yanga. WOCCU plans to increase its PDA distribution to the other CUs participating in the program, too. The technology is expected to eventually enable representatives to reach people from more than 11,000 villages in 22 Mexican states.