Design Considerations for a Financial Management System for Rural, Semi-literate Users

This paper describes the design considerations for financial management system for community-based microfinance institutions in rural India. It states that:

• The traditional system of data management in standard ledgers and notebooks are marred with information gaps;
• The proposed design for a new financial management system attempts to remove the bottlenecks that the documentation process faces.

About the new financial management system, the paper highlights the following:

• The navigation paths are represented numerically, so the self-help group (SHG) members have to only memorize few numbers to be able to access the functions;
• For better acceptance by the communities, the new design prototype has incorporated the earlier model of data organization.

Finally, it states that all attempts have been made to look at a new form of information system where a physical paper-based data format complements the digital system, which is cost effective and is a locally sustainable solution.