KCB Rwanda, a subsidiary of the Kenya Commercial Bank (KCB) Group, yesterday launched agency banking service as a way of tapping into the unbanked population. KCB Rwanda becomes the first lender to introduce the agent banking system in the country. Under the new service dubbed ‘KCB Iwacu,’ which holds promises of fundamentally changing the practise of banking in Rwanda, it is the owner of the retail outlet, rather than a branch teller, who conducts the basic transactions for clients such as making of deposits, withdrawals, and transfers of funds. New entrant, Equity Bank also uses the same platform which has been successfully implemented in Kenya. KCB Rwanda’s Managing Director, Maurice K. Toroitich told reporters at a media briefing in Kigali Friday that the platform will revolutionise banking systems in Rwanda. The lender has rolled out the new service with 130 outlets countrywide, with hopes of increasing them to 400 by the end of this year. "The bank is taking advantage of technology revolution to immediately start offering branchless banking services throughout the 30 districts of Rwanda,” Toroitich said.  The bank targets to increase its customer base from 60,000 to 100,000 this year. "The product is in the pursuit of the bank’s financial inclusion strategy and in support of the government’s vision to enhance the level of financial inclusion in the country,” he added. On KCB Group level, the service started last year and has so far enrolled 3296 agents with an average monthly transactions of 40,000 deposits and 8,000 withdrawals. "It takes minimal cost to access the service and it is far less than the costs customers currently spend visiting branches to access banking services,” Toroitich noted. Rwanda targets to increase the banked population to 80 per cent by 2020. Currently, only 21 per cent of Rwandans have access to banking services, while 26 per cent have access to informal banking facilities. Toroitich also said that their target is to increase the bank’s branch network to 12 from 10 this year. In addition, 10 new ATMs would be added to existing network of 14 ATMs. KCB Group has 222 branches and 924 ATM points across East Africa Region.  Toroitich also disclosed that the KCB group would be opening operations in Burundi next month, making their presence available to all East African member states.     Advantages of the systems KCB Rwanda’s Head of Retail Banking, Gloria Nyambok, explained that agency banking is closer to the customers; and it opens longer hours than user banks. "On KCB Iwacu, our client can withdrawal or deposit cash, loan withdrawal and repayment, they can pay their bills, withdrawal of retirement and social benefits  and transfer funds,” Nyambok explained. In order to support this service, the bank has upgraded its mobile phone banking platform in order to offer the traditional cell phone based services but in addition, to offer a robust platform from where to offer agency-banking services. "It is incorporating an internet-based option for smart phone holders, which means that it does not matter who the mobile phone service provider is, but also a USSD based banking offering for those Rwandans who may not have access to smart phones,” Toroitich explained. Unstructured Supplementary Service Data (USSD) is a protocol used by GSM cellular telephones to communicate with the service provider’s computers.