ssl-cct: overview on payment mechanisms and monitoring
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South-South Learning on Conditional Cash Transfers - Session III: Payment Mechanisms and Monitoring and EvaluationTRANSCRIPT
Monitoring, evaluation and payment systems
Marco Stampini,
IDB-ADB South-South learning event on Conditional Cash Transfers
Manila, 16-19 April 2013
Monitoring and evaluation (M&E)
Why M&E?
• CCTs distribute cash
they can be criticized on grounds of political manipulation of the pool of beneficiaries
To address the potential problem, CCT programs have produced an unprecedented effort to generate solid evidence on their effectiveness and efficiency:
– Monitoring: collection of administrative data on program inputs and outputs
– Evaluation: generation of evidence on processes and results (outcomes / impacts)
Monitoring
• Requires advanced Management Information Systems (MISs)
• It is usually conducted in-house (program staff)
• It records:
– Program inputs (budget, human resources, etc.)
– Data on beneficiaries: socioeconomic characteristics at application, eligibility status, incorporation, compliance with co-responsibilities, payments of transfers and exit
Monitoring feeds program design
• Mexico’s Oportunidades:
– production of bimonthly monitoring indicators
– validated through committee of academics and government officials (incl. health and education ministries)
– results feed back into program design: • extension of education grants to high school students
• Introduction of Youth with Opportunities, a saving plan (starting from ninth grade) that can be cashed at secondary school graduation
• Jamaica’s PATH • Monitoring data led to tiered and gender differentiated payment
system for school children, in response to findings that dropout rates among boys were higher than among girls
Evaluation
• It generally requires the collection of household data
• Most credible when conducted by independent bodies
• Two key types:
– Process evaluation (documents whether and how important CCT operational processes work)
– Impact evaluation (measures existence and magnitude of causal effects of program participation – e.g. on poverty, access to schooling and health care)
Impact evaluation of PROGRESA
• “what really makes Mexico’s program iconic are the successive waves of data collected to evaluate its impact, the placement of those data in the public domain, and the resulting hundreds of papers and thousands of references that such dissemination has generated” (Fiszbein and Schady 2009, p.6)
• over 1,000 related scholarly articles found on the internet
• Over the period 1997-2000
• 506 rural localities, about 24 000 households
• 320 randomly assigned to treatment, 186 control
• Collection of comprehensive data (including consumption) every six months
M&E budgets
Country & program
Structures Number of permanent personnel
Budget (2012) – USD
Number of published studies in 2012
Brazil – Bolsa Familia
Secretariat of Evaluation and Information Management Department of Unified Registry
65 29
7,4 million 7,7 million
28 studies (6 focused on Bolsa Familia)
Colombia – Familias en Acción
National Coordination Unit
8 at Federal level plus 27 at regional level
2.45 million (2008-2012)
1 impact evaluation study
High quality monitoring and evaluation require a considerable budget
M&E – Lessons learned
• The dissemination of the results of regular evaluations is fundamental to maintain the credibility of the programs, and ensure their political sustainability
• M&E data is key to identifying implementation bottlenecks and possible solutions (incremental tweaks to program design)
• M&E systems must be an integral part of program development (from the very early stages)
• M&E systems, including the construction of MISs, require substantial financial resources and the recruitment of highly qualified personnel
• M&E units work best and are most credible when they are independent from program management and have access to senior government officials
Payment systems
Payment systems – Costs
Country Cost per transaction (administrative cost for the program)
# of payments per year
Yearly cost
(USD)
Honduras 2.5% of total amount (USD 2-6) 3 6 - 18
Jamaica USD 0.46 per check delivered through post office
6 2.8
Brazil USD 0.88 with limited account / USD 0.60 with account
12 10.6 /
7.2
Colombia USD 6.24 with account 6 37.4
Mexico USD 2.35 cash / USD 2.84 with account
5 11.75 /
14.2
Peru USD 3.43 in cash / USD 0.76 branch
6 20.6 /
4.6
Source: Tejerina (2013) based on personal communications with program staff
Payment systems – bankarization
• After years of cash delivery through program offices or mobile cash machine, all programs are transitioning towards payments bankarization
0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80% 90% 100%
2009
2010
2011
% of beneficiary households
In cash
bank card - with chip debit card
account deposit
Payment methods used by Mexico’s Oportunidades, 2009-11
Payments – rationale for bankarization
• Cut wait and collection time (lower opportunity costs)
• Increase transparency (ensuring that the transfers reach the intended beneficiaries)
• Improve M&E, through the development of dedicated information technology systems
• Foster financial market development (incorporation of previously unbanked households - e.g. in Colombia)
• Potentially, increase beneficiaries’ sense of belonging to the CCT program
Payments – frequent issues
• Lack or remoteness of bank branches
• Retention of cards by cash machine or bank staff
• Lack of explanation for blocked payment
• Subtraction of bank fees
• Limitation on the possible use of bank cards, with constraint on selected categories of goods
• Non-functioning cash machines
• Limitation on the set of accessible cash machines, or on the hours of operation
• Inappropriate use of bank cards, with individuals withdrawing on behalf of a number of beneficiary households
Payments – frequent issues
• Given the mentioned issues, it is extremely important that CCT programs establish customer services, either through local offices or call centers, to handle payment related complaints
• In addition, CCT programs can employ alternative networks of providers:
– Post offices (Jamaica)
– Lottery offices, certified bakeries and markets (Brazil)
• Where all networks fail to reach, program staff visits the communities to distribute the cash transfers (e.g. in Mexico)
Payment systems – Lessons learned
• CCT programs tend to converge towards payments through banks (most often via bank cards)
• Engaging the bank network requires negotiation to define: – minimum service standards (ensuring quality for CCT beneficiaries, e.g.
in terms of flexibility of cashing options)
– a reasonable upper bound to the payment of fees
• This negotiation may lead to the expansion of the services for CCT beneficiaries, beyond the payment of the transfer
• Payments through cell phones represent the next frontier, either as the main form of payment (e.g. in specific areas of Colombia) or as a complement to more traditional platforms (e.g. in Brazil)
