Mobile Banking Adoption and Financial Credit Accessibility in Wote Sub – County, Makueni County, Kenya

Abstract

Although the financial system is a vital component of the socio-economic development of any nation, most Kenyans lack access to formal financial credit services. This arises due to the cause of putting up bank branches in the rural areas is deemed not economically viable. Most banks have partnered with Mobile Network Operators to help mitigate this problem by introducing the use of Mobile banking (M-banking) technology in accessing vital banking services such as financial credit. However, this effort may not attain success if the factors inhibiting the use of M-banking technology have not been assessed. The purpose of this study was to establish the effect of Mobile banking adoption on financial credit accessibility by residents in Wote sub-county. This study was necessitated by the current emerging trend of accessing financial credit through the Mobile banking system. This study adopted a technology acceptance model to establish the effects of adopting mobile banking and its application in use of banking services among residents of Wote sub-county. The study was guided by the following objectives: To establish the effect of perceived usefulness, perceived ease of use, and perceived risk of using mobile banking technology and financial credit accessibility in Wote sub-county, Makueni county, Kenya. Descriptive research design was employed in which the study population comprised the residents of Wote sub-county. The target population of the study consisted of 137,944 mobile money users across both banked and non-banked population in Wote sub-county and the sample size comprised of 138 participants who were selected through the use of simple random sampling technique. Data was collected using a questionnaire whose reliability was established by use of Cronbach’s Alpha. All items in the questionnaire had a score of above 0.7 which was deemed to be the acceptable threshold. The questionnaires were administered through drop and pick later method. The data collected was processed and analysed using SPSS. Descriptive statistics such as percentages, frequencies, standard deviation and mean scores were used. Afterwards, the research findings were presented using frequency tables, pie charts and bar graphs. Multiple regression analysis was used to analyse and draw inferences from the research data. The results indicated that perceived usefulness of mobile banking technology perceived ease of use of mobile banking technology, and perceived risk of using mobile banking technology were statistically significant in accessing of financial credit. The intervening variable- customers’ attitude- was found to be non-significant. This study recommended that both the banks and MNO’s to continuously invest in product improvement of mobile banking systems to ensure the uptake of mobile credit is enhanced. The study also recommended that the financial service providers should engage in education and extensive customer awareness on use of mobile applications to access mobile credit as well as draw up strategies to reduce the mobile phone operational costs such as the interest charged on mobile loans which are a major hindrance. Further, the banks and MNO’s should increase extra security features in their systems to increase trust in accessing mobile credit. Finally, the service providers should make mobile banking more user friendly for ease of financial credit access by incorporating graphics interface.