Study: cash has important role to play in financial inclusion

The ATM Industry Association has published a new study on the role cash plays in financial inclusion.

The study presents an international picture of the importance of cash and ATMs in reaching two billion financially excluded persons who have no bank account.

According to the Financial Inclusion Commission, 1.5 million adults remain unbanked in Britain today.

The paper argues that cash is only payment method that people can access without having to meet prerequisite conditions.

Mike Lee, CEO of ATMIA, said: “It argues persuasively, in a fact-based approach, that removing cash from campaigns to include the unbanked in financial services would represent a gargantuan governmental folly, creating unbridgeable social and class divides in future.”

The study’s author, Guillaume Lepecq, commented: “A transition away from cash would only serve to isolate the unbanked and the underserved from the rest of the population.”