Remittances, Payments, and Money Transfers: Behaviors of South Asians and Indonesians

Abstract

Remittances, Payments, and Money Transfers: Behaviors of South Asians and Indonesians offers an in-depth look at the remittance and payment behaviors of people in South Asia and Indonesia, based on survey results from six South Asian nations and Indonesia.

This project leverages Gallup’s worldwide research initiative to better understand the remittance and payment behavior of South Asians and Indonesians. Through its World Poll project, Gallup conducts nationally representative surveys on an ongoing basis in more than 150 countries and areas to provide a scientific window into the thoughts and behaviors of 98% of the Earth's population. The World Poll is the only global study of its kind. The data for this study consist of a section of 69 questions on remittances and payments added to the World Poll surveys of at least 1,000 adults in Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Indonesia, Nepal, Pakistan, and Sri Lanka and 2,540 adults in India. The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation provided support for this project.

Gallup conducted the surveys from Sept. 5 to Oct. 13, 2012. Questions covered respondents’ remittance and payment behaviors through services such as domestic money transfers, international remittances, government and wage payments, and utilities and other bills. The survey also included questions about making payments to schools, companies, or other institutions. The survey did not include questions on transactions with local counterparties (i.e., retail or other face-to-face transactions). Instead, respondents were asked about remittances and payments involving distant counterparties (i.e., living in different areas or cities) during the 30 days, three months, or 12 months before the survey. Respondents who reported being payers, payees, or both were asked follow-up questions about the distribution channels used to send or receive money: cash sent by another person, such as a friend, brought in person, bank transfer, mobile phone money transfer, money transfer service (i.e., Western Union), credit card, post office, or some other way.

Respondents were also asked about instances in which they lost money, were overcharged, or were cheated when either sending or receiving remittances or payments. This section was followed by a module examining the most expensive way respondents reported either sending or receiving money. Finally, respondents were asked about their use of mobile phones and the Internet to understand how it might affect their use of emerging technologies such as mobile phone money transfers and Internet-based banking.

This study is a replication of a similar Gallup study Payments and Money Transfer Behavior of Sub-Saharan Africans by Jake Kendall, Johanna Godoy, Jan Sonnenschein, and Bob Tortora.

Keywords: payments, remittances, mobile money, transfers, financial inclusion