- To grow 7% over the next 7yrs
Small and Medium Enterprises, SMEs, around the world contributed about $850 billion or 25 percent of global annual bank earnings.
This was disclosed in a report by McKinsey and Company, a global management consulting firm, which also projected a rise in revenue generation for SMEs in Africa, thus supporting African banks to increase their SME Banking portfolio.
The contribution to the annual revenue of banks, according to the report, is expected to grow by approximately seven percent annually over the next seven years.
According to the report, SMEs form the backbone of many economies around the world, particularly Africa.
As a customer segment, SMEs offer vast potential, they noted. However, the profits of SME-focused financial institutions have traditionally lagged behind those that specialise in other customer segments, often because of highly varied credit quality in the portfolio, according to expert views.
Corroborating the report findings, the experts said in a statement that finding the optimal balance between providing a great customer experience and managing the cost to serve has also proven to be difficult. As a result, many financial institutions have not prioritised SMEs, forsaking the vast potential value and leaving many SMEs feeling that their needs are ignored.
“But now, new customer propositions and better service models, enabled by technology, are creating opportunities for much more lucrative returns. Financial technology firms (FinTechs) are entering the business. Big technology firms are also coming into the arena with innovative service models that reduce costs and increase revenue.
The FinTechs offerings include traditional banking products and many other business services such as invoice management, payroll support, tax preparation and inventory management.
Such beyond-banking ecosystem offerings target customers’ fundamental needs in a single, easy-to-use service,” the statement said.
Even better, the fintech and big tech firm answer the primary challenge of SMEs, giving entrepreneurs more time to focus on their core business activities. Meantime, while seeking creative strategies to profitably serve the SME market, a number of African creditors are leveraging SystemSpecs-owned payroll solutions, particularly Remita, as they adopt an ecosystem approach in tapping this vast market, the statement added.
For instance, Access Bank offers Remita Payroll solutions to serve its SME customers as an integral part of its beyond-banking strategy. Remita Payroll & HR is an innovative online digital solution that empowers SMEs and large organisations to easily process and pay salaries and manage other related human resource needs.
Remita Payroll also gives SMEs effective control of their payroll processing and deductions including all statutory contributions and tax payments, as well as other electronic payments to vendors.
The difficult and unending hours spent by SMEs to process payroll, payments, reporting and reconciliations are addressed by Remita Payroll & HR, according t9 the statement.
Managing Director of Access Bank, Ghana, Kris Ifeanyi Njoku, corroborated the efficiency of the solution, saying that the bank’s integration with Remita Payroll system have formed part of the bank’s long-term objectives of meeting the needs of the various organisations regarding payroll management.
Divisional Head, Payment Applications and Vertical Markets at SystemSpecs, David Okeme, said, “As technology providers, we are convinced that this partnership provides Access Bank’s customers and non-customers with new and exciting capability and flexibility for the management of payroll processing and payments at such a low cost”.
He maintained that the partnership aligns with SystemSpecs’ vision of becoming an institution of reference, especially in the provision of seamless technology solutions for payroll and payments management across Africa.