Mobile Financial Services (MFS) or mobile banking is an important medium for immediate financial transactions at the marginal level. In addition to sending money, many new services are also available in this service. Customers are getting various services including paying electricity, gas, water bills, paying shopping bills, distributing salaries and allowances, and sending money from abroad (remittance). The MFS medium is becoming more popular day by day.
The latest update report of Bangladesh Bank says that the second highest transaction was made through mobile banking in a single month last October. Last June, 1,55,835 crore taka was transacted. This was the highest in a single month. Financial transactions on mobile increased even more in October this year. This month, 1,54,857 crore taka was transacted, which is the second highest transaction in a single month.
In the previous month, September, 1,45,68 crore taka was transacted. Accordingly, transactions increased by 9,790 crore taka in a month. The transaction amount in August was 1,37,921 crore taka. And in July, the first month of the current fiscal year, 1 lakh 22 thousand 922 crore taka was transacted.
The journey of financial services through mobile phones in the country began on March 31, 2011. This service was first launched by the private sector Dutch-Bangla Bank (Rocket). Later, bKash, as a subsidiary of BRAC Bank, launched the MFS service. Later, many other banks have introduced this service. Currently, in addition to bKash and Rocket, there are My Cash, M Cash, Upaya, Sure Cash, etc. Apart from this, the postal department also provides this service.
Now, mobile banking is not only a means of sending money, but also one of the means of all types of transactions, especially paying utility bills, school fees, shopping, government allowances, purchasing tickets, paying insurance premiums, mobile recharges and donations.
According to the central bank, the amount of mobile transactions in the first month of this year, January, was 1 lakh 29 thousand 500 crore taka. In the second month, February, transactions were 1 lakh 30 thousand 140 crore taka. In April and May, transactions were 1,44,929 crore and 1,40,952 crore taka respectively.
In the last month of last year, December, transactions were 1,24,548 crore taka; in November, 1,19,679 crore taka. In October, transactions were 1,20,596 crore taka. In September, 1,8,378 crore taka, and in August, transactions were 1,9,555 crore taka.
The report says that in the last four months of the 2022-23 fiscal year (March, April, May and June), transactions worth more than one lakh crore taka were made on mobile. In the first month of the 2023-24 fiscal year, in July, it fell below one lakh crore taka, to 98,306 crore taka. Since then, transactions worth more than one lakh crore taka have been made through this medium every month. In December 2018, transactions worth 32,116 crore taka were made on mobile. The use of mobile financial services or MFS in the country is increasing rapidly.
The number of mobile banking customers has been increasing since its launch. In December 2018, the total number of subscribers was 67.670,468. In October this year, that number increased three and a half times to 235.74713. In the previous month, September, the number of subscribers was 233.773,523.
