P9 - a money-management service for poor households

P9 in Bangladesh

'P9 Hrishipara' has been running since early 2007 in Hrishipara village in Gazipur District, Bangladesh.

It was devised and is managed by Shohoz Shonchoy, a microfinance organisation (MFO). 

Information about Shohoz Shonchoy can be found at thepoorandtheirmoney

P9 Kalyanpur 

P9 Kalyanpur started in Kalyanpur slum, in Dhaka city, in October 2010. It was established by Shohoz Shonchoy and then transferred to SafeSave, its sister MFO, in August 2011.

It was discontinued in late 2013 as a result of changes in the legal identity of SafeSave.

P9 in Kenya

A version of P9, called Jipange Kusave, delivered by mobile phone, was piloted in Kenya by Mobile Ventures, supported by UK Aid.

For a public announcement please go to cgap.org/p/site/c/template.rc/1.11.45745/1.26.13234/ 

The pilot was deemed a success but a commercial partner could not be identified, so activity closed in 2012. However, many of the ideas, and some of the personnel, were taken up in the very successful M-Shwari project (http://www.cbagroup.com/m-shwari/). For a discussion of the influence of Jipange Kusave on M-Shwari go to the CGAP blog at http://www.cgap.org/blog/jipange-kusave-m-shwari-and-influence-startups. 

Readers who may like to get involved with P9 are invited to go to the 'Binimoy' website.   

Recent news

July-August 2024: this was a difficult period. Student led demonstrations against the unloved Awami League's government caused it to fall. Markets were briefly closed and some forms of transport were halted, and incomes and shop turnover were affected. Nevertheless our clients responded by saving more than usual.

September 2023: Stuart Rutherford visited to coincide with a visit by Brett Matthews of My Oral Village to set up the project (funded by Gojo Foundation) that will examine whether innumerate people can be taught to keep their own diaries, whether they would be willing to do so, and if so whether there would be any benefit to them

January 2023: we had an enjoyable visit from a team from Gojo & Co, the Tokyo-based microfinance funding entity.

November 2022: the improvement over the last year has been steadily maintained. This month, for example, we experienced growth in the savings portfolio and in profits.

November 2021: things return to something like normal, with good repayment rates and loan interest payment rates

July 2021: a severe COVID lockdown started and our business was almost entirely closed for the month. We made the biggest loss since April of 2020.

April and May 2021: a fresh spike in infections led the government to impose a new lockdown on April 5th. We stopped field collection in person soon after, and cash inflows are down compared to March. The lockdown was extended through May.

March 2021: a year ago transactions halted for the lockdown. But this month, despite sharply rising new corona infections to levels above those seen last year, there has been no lockdown (so far) and transactions have returned to something like normal.

June to November 2020: the first months after the lockdown was lifted saw a remarkable recovery: savings deposits rose very sharply, and loan repayments returned to higher levels than before corona started.

May 2020: the second full month of lockdown. We made a few more transactions than in April, though we made a bigger loss because we paid staff their Eid festival bonuses. The losses remain manageable.

April 2020: April is the first full month under lockdown. We managed to release savings to those who asked for withdrawals. A few taka came in as loan repayments. We made a loss of 40,000 taka (about $470). We can survive losses of this kind easily, for several months.

March 2020: Corona virus has struck. The government closed all offices from 26th March. We have obeyed, but are finding ways to release savings to those who want them and to give a few loans. 

May 2019: L-IFT, based in The Netherlands, agrees to fund all the fieldwork for the Daily Diaries for an indefinite period of at least one year. 

May 2017: UNCDF agreed to fund the Daily Diaries for a further two years, from June 2017. We have uploaded a further blog to the Global Development Institute site, on health spending.

November 2016: with Stuart Rutherford in Bangladesh we pushed forward on the Daily Diaries. We anticipate some further publications.

August 2016: two blogs were published about the Daily Diaries, one by Global Development Institute and one by CGAP.

July 2016: we have sharply reduced our volume of business because of a deterioration in the regulatory environment: more details on the Status page

April 2016: Mark Zuckerberg published his list of the '23 books everyone should read', with Portfolios of the Poor at number 5.

April 2016: We are a preparing a website dedicated to the Hrishipara Daily Diaries at sites.google.com/site/hrishiparadailydiaries/

Finally in mid October 2015 (after many delays) we started using smartphones to collect data in the field, modeled on the systems perfected at SafeSave over the last decade. Thanks to our software writers, QSoft.

In September 2015 National Public Radio in the United States interviewed one of our daily diary respondents, Kamala. In addition to the radio broadcast the reporter wrote a blog that can be seen here 

In August 2015 the World Bank has decided to support the daily diary research with a small contract for a year's worth of data collection. We have begun to increase the number of respondents.

Sadly, in early September 2015, Dipali Rani, who features in the case-studies as an exceptional P9 saver, died suddenly of a stroke. She leaves a husband and three children. Her accumulated P9 savings, which are very substantial for such a poor woman, have over time been transferred to a P9 Special Savings account, on which interest is earned. She nominated her husband to inherit her savings. He is by local report a very stable person and will be able to bring up the children with the help of his mother.  

We reported in May 2015 that we had began to run daily financial diaries for a small number of our clients. A Report on the first month's diaries for the first two respondents can be found on the data page.

During March 2015 we have been working with the international NGO Save the Children whose Yangon office is preparing a programme for poor urban woman in a major township of Myanmar. Their idea is to create a 'graduation programme' with similarities to BRAC's 'Ultra Poor' programme but using a version of P9 for debt-release and money-management stabilization for the often highly indebted poor population.

Unfortunately, in December 2014, a new laptop bought for the upcoming system of data collection by smartphone, was stolen by motorbike-mounted thieves from Kalimullah, the Hrishipara Manager, who was riding a rickshaw at the time. He was not hurt. A replacement laptop has been bought.

We have recently devised several more product rule-sets, all based on the P9 approach. We show two. One is a version of P9 which imitates as closely as possible the cash-flows found in a ROSCA. The other is the most simplified version of the P9 idea that we have yet imagined. Both can be found on the databank page.

A video by CGAP about the Bangladeshi mobile-phone company bKash was filmed in part in Hrishipara and shows good views of the village and nearby town. It is available at 

www.youtube.com/watch?v=GW58h0VwlCc&noredirect=1

We updated a couple of our case studies at the end of February 2014. 

In November 2013 CGAP published an article showing how Jipange Kusave (the product modeled on P9 and offered by mobile phone in Kenya - see note this page) lies behind the currently successful product known as M-Shwari in Kenya. Since its start up a little over a year ago M-Shwari has reached over 6 million customers, captured more than $300 million in savings and lent more than $60 million. You can read the article here.

In the autumn of 2013 SafeSave changed its legal identity (for more see safesave.org). As a result, P9 Kalyanpur has been closed. This site now focuses on the continuing story of P9 in its original home, Hrishipara 

In June 2013 two new products were incorporated into P9 Hrishipara. One is an interest-bearing passbook savings account and the other is a loan on interest (with no deductions into savings). This allows us to incorporate the existing P5 and P7 Hrishipara products into P9. See the new rules and see the update.

In February 2013 there was a fire in Kalyanpur that destroyed about 80 homes and shops and badly damaged the livelihoods or homes of 36 of our clients. See more on the data page.

In January 2013 we have posted a new review by scholar Ashirul Amin which looks at clients who don't take any cash out when they borrow. 

October 2012 we have posted a review called 'How Well have they Saved?' on the Five Years On page

Latest revised Product Rules are now displayed on the Product Rules page.

Approximately one third of P9 loans are repaid within 3 months, two thirds within 6 months, and almost all within 9 months. See Tufts scholar Ashirul Amin's new analysis.

P9 is five years old. The first nine clients signed up in March 2007

We look back at what has happened to the clients who opened accounts in the first few months of P9, in a new page 'Five Years On'

A blog was published by CGAP (the World Bank section that deals with microfinance) describing the principles behind P9. Available at http://microfinance.cgap.org/2012/03/21/4340/

Scholar Ashirul Amin has provided tables and graphs summarising P9 in Hrishipara up to end January 2012. Access it on the data page.

On 1st February 2012 P9 Kalyanpur added a further Collector: we anticipate faster growth as a result.

The SafeSave 2010-2011 Report and the Shohoz Shonchoy 2010-2011 Audit have been added to the data page.

The three Case Studies have been updated to December 2011.

A new report on P9 in Kalyanpur has been prepared by Katja Buhrer. It describes her understanding of how P9 clients use the product, what they think of it, and what it means in their lives. Please find it on the data page.

On August 1st 2011 P9 Kalyanpur was transferred from Stuart Rutherford's ownership to SafeSave. This is good news for P9 Kalyanpur - see the status page. 

On August 1st 2011 new product rules rules came into effect for P9 Hrishipara, with immediate effect on transaction volumes and profitability - see the status page. 

On May 1st 2011, a fire broke out in Kalyanpur and destroyed about 100 homes. As far as we know, no-one was killed. P9 staff and property were unharmed. The fire occurred in two 'sections' of the slum where P9 does not yet work. The slum is known locally as 'purabustee' ('fire-slum') because it suffers so often from fires which spread quickly among the close-packed bamboo-sided huts that characterize the slum.