Customer-centricity is deeply embedded in the culture and decision-making processes at JUMO. The company, as a whole, is committed to delivering the best value for customers. We have several tools, practices, and policies that help us ensure we keep customers as the lens of focus. JUMO’s Customer Experience Delivery Manager, Estelle Du Toit, unpacks the impact of our customer operating principles.
‘JUMO strives to offer financial services to people who have been excluded from the formal financial system. Ensuring we build products and systems that are inclusive, and have the lowest barriers to entry, is therefore critical to our mission and informs product design.
Examples of this in action include favouring a USSD service platform (which is the lowest common denominator) and offering easy to understand product journeys. We also ensure all our communication (from terms and conditions to marketing messages) is written in plain, simple language that can be understood by anyone, including those who may not have had exposure to financial services before.
It’s about empowerment
Our customer research shows we are succeeding in our financial inclusion goals. About 80% of customers use JUMO’s platform to access a financial product for the first time. This indicates we are offering fit-for-purpose services and products to a large, previously unreached segment of the market.
At JUMO, we are driven to influence and build a sustainable digital financial ecosystem. Digital financial services are relatively new to our markets, and we have a unique opportunity to influence and build a foundation that seeks to protect and is fair. Our most important focus areas are: complying with the highest regulation legislation and developing policies and processes committed to treating customers fairly.
At JUMO we pride ourselves on not only providing customers with another choice, but by giving them a better choice.
Many of the people we serve have had to resort to using informal means to borrow money. This is usually unsafe, expensive, can require collateral and may not always be available. JUMO offers secure, non-collateralised access to capital, provided by reputable banking partners, available 24/7, and with the lowest opportunity cost built-in.
A value-added, responsible approach
When we look at financial value we have to consider the cost to the customer holistically. It’s not just about fees charged, it’s about ease of access. There are opportunity costs to using non-digital financial products, such as time away from business or work to visit a bank, reduced earnings as result, hefty travel costs to reach a microfinance provider etc. Plus there’s risk and exclusion if collateral has to be provided.
JUMO’s banking service platform runs on data, which is what makes financial inclusion possible. Our ability to extract value from data to benefit customers and ecosystem partners is our ‘secret sauce’. However, as a fintech company, we have a responsibility to not just protect customer data, but to facilitate a fair exchange of value for that data. Personal data is not a commodity. We do not sell or distribute it for profit, we use it to benefit people as part of a partnership agreement. Protection of that data is rigidly upheld through frameworks, protocols and safeguards that ensure privacy and security.
We have built successful commercial partnerships with multiple banks and capital providers, as well as mobile data and payments providers in all our markets, for the ultimate benefit of financially excluded individuals. Having a multi-partner platform means we can offer the best-fit, lowest-cost products to customers, while extending our reach into new market segments, which stimulates the growth of the entire ecosystem. We call it a win-win business model, because we win when the customers using our platform win.’
