ASSESSING OPPORTUNITIES AND CHALLENGES OF CBE – BIRR MOBILE MONEY SERVICE: CASE STUDY ON COMMERCIAL BANK OF ETHIOPIA

Abstract

CBE-BIRR is an agent banking service introduced by Commercial Bank of Ethiopia and CBE-BIRR customers can transfer money to subscribed or unsubscribed users, deposit and withdraw cash from agents, buy airtime directly without scratching mobile cards, pay for goods and services. The general objective of the study is to assess the challenges, opportunities and factors influencing customers’ intention to use CBE – BIRR Mobile money service. The total sample size was 382 also research paper employs convenient to select the respondent. Most respondents agreed that Resistance to changes in technology by the society, Limitation in building effective agent network and Lack of reliable customer support service are the main challenges for implementation and expansion of CBE – BIRR mobile money service. The most ranked opportunities identified in this study that large number of respondent agreed on opportunities of implementing and expanding CBE – BIRR mobile money service in commercial bank of Ethiopia is that Commitment of the government to strengthen the banking industry, late adopter opportunities, Increment of educated potential customer and Improvement in the banking habit of the society. The survey result shows that R-square value is 0.707 which is 70.7% of the variation in dependent variable (intention to use CBE - BIRR) is explained by the predictors namely; perceived ease of use, perceived usefulness, perceived trust and perceived risk. The hypothesis test summary revealed that H1, H2 and H4 has a positive and significant effect on behavioral intention towards using CBE – BIRR mobile money so the hypothesis is accepted and H3 is rejected because the calculated t-statistic value is negative. The researcher also recommend Banks should launch campaigns to create direct awareness to potential adopters, issues such as fear of the lack of privacy and security, together with relative advantages of using Agent banking services.