Nagad wants to make financial activities easier: MD

Nagad, the mobile financial service (MFS) arm of the Bangladesh Post Office, wants to make the financial activities of country's people much easier with lower cost and also to bring them under formal financial umbrella, said Tanvir A Mishuk, managing director of Nagad.

"Our journey has just begun. You will see big changes in 2022. Now our goal is to make the financial activities of country's people easier in terms of technology and lower cost. At the same time, I want every person in Bangladesh to come under the formal financial umbrella," he said.

While talking to BSS on the eve of 3rd founding anniversary of this fast growing mobile financial service, Tanvir said if such thing happens, then Bangladesh would become a developed country even before 2041.

"Overall, I want to change the face of Bangladesh's financial sector through Nagad," he said.

Nagad was formally inaugurated by Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina on March 26 in 2019, to lead the country's booming Digital Financial Service (DFS) revolution.

This MFS, which sped up the overall financial inclusion in Bangladesh, has emerged as the fastest-growing MFS in the world in just about three years of its inception in 2019, thanks to the adoption of state-of-the-art technologies.

When asked how Bangladesh's financial sector is performing against global peers, Tanvir said whatever it is, be it economic prosperity or affordability, Bangladesh is now in a much better position than ever before.

"We're making improvements in socioeconomic indicators. Information technology services are reaching door-to-door. All this actually sends the right message about our progress," he said.

Asked about Bangladesh's potentials of becoming a cashless society, Tanvir said becoming a cashless society is just a matter of time for Bangladesh seeing how widely mobile financial services are being used.

"We've initiated digitalisation in the financial sector through e-KYC and this has received an overwhelming response from the public. Since then, many more inventions have been added to it," he said.

Noting that solid foundations are there, he said, "I feel now is the time to move forward. Many more innovations will be added to this sector in the coming days, which will establish a cashless society,"

Tanvir said the mobile phone will dominate all financial transactions adding that day is not too far perhaps in five years.

When sought comments on Nagad's strive for digital banking, the managing director said that they want to establish Nagad as a full-fledged digital financial service provider. "We are calling it Nagad 2.0 -- for that, we are proceeding strategically,"

He informed that Nagad is planning to bring all the transactions in a person's day-to-day life onto the device while all government fees and bills can be paid instantly from anyone's phone.

"All in all, we will have all the arrangements in our planned digital financial service so that the transaction needs can be met and businesses can swiftly get capital as long as one is connected to a mobile phone," he informed.

Answering to a question, he opined that the infrastructure and business environment that the government has put in place over the last decade have solved this problem of cost-effective solutions at some point.

About the Nagad's journey forward, Tanvir said in less than 10 months of the launch, Nagad's daily transaction volume crossed Taka 100 crore.

"Since then, various innovations and customer-friendly services have accelerated the popularity of Nagad," Tanvir said adding that they want to build Nagad as a successful organisation that can play a role in the lives of ordinary people.

"We want to make profit ethically.....We want to create a win-win situation," he said.

About the Nagad's attainments over the years as one of the major MFS carriers, the Nagad managing director said, "I want ordinary people to use Nagad as a tool to improve their lives......our goal will be fulfilled when we'll see that all the people of the country will think of Nagad as a part of their lives,"

Right at the start of Nagad, Tanvir said they introduced e-KYC as well as evolved a mechanism that is suitable for a button phone where anyone can open an account by dialling *167# from any mobile phone and setting a four-digit PIN.

Replying to a question, he said the first official transaction took place on March 26, 2019. It was a transaction of Taka 10,000 between Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina and Minister for Posts and Telecommunications Mostafa Jabbar.

Taking the advantages of Nagad, during the Covid-19 pandemic, the government launched the digital process of disbursing social safety net allowances, financial grants and other assistance of the Prime Minister.

Nagad, which is looking forward to facilitating all the country's citizens with all sorts of financial transactions, had cut the cash-out charge to Taka 9.99 per Taka 1,000, lowest among country's all MFS operators, and made sending money and paying utility bills free, encouraging the people to use the platform.

The registered clients of Nagad is now around six crore while the daily average transaction through this carrier is Taka 750 crore.

In the last fiscal year (FY21), Nagad has distributed various government support amounts directly to some 3 crore people by 8 crore times. This has made the government support distribution process more transparent, easier and corruption free.

Only because of easy account opening process in Nagad, some 3.40 crore clients have been included in the financial sector in 2021 and thus reaching the total number of registered clients to 5.80 crore over the last 3 years.