Page 50 - ITU-T Focus Group Digital Financial Services – Recommendations

ITU-T Focus Group Digital Financial Services
Recommendations

Title of recommendation USSD access and regulatory focus
Working Group Technology, Innovation and Competition

Workstream Mobile handsets use
Audience for recommendation Regulators in the DFS ecosystem

Despite the increase in alternative access mechanisms, the continuity of feature phone penetration and growth
means that access to DFS services is likely to continue to be via USSD and STK, and therefore regulatory focus on
these access mechanisms should persist.

Basic and feature phones currently constitute the majority of the phones used in DFS ecosystems worldwide.
They are likely to dominate for the next few years.

A move to a more smartphone-centric ecosystem using app-based DFS access may be circumscribed by the
lack of national high speed 3G/4G mobile data coverage in many of the countries where DFS is provided. The
lack of high speed mobile data coverage mainly affects rural areas, where USSD & STK dominate.
The sub-optimal user experience of having to run relatively higher bandwidth-requiring smartphone apps in
a 2G/2G+ environment, suggests that the current basic USSD and STK bearer access types for DFS services as
used on basic and feature phones are likely to persist.
Existing concerns in some markets on Fair, Reasonable and Non Discriminatory terms for access to these
basic 2G/2G+ USSD and STK bearer services is likely to require continued regulatory focus on these access
mechanisms.

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