“The year 2022 heralds the development of the Kenya Vision 2030 Fourth Medium Term Plan (2023 – 2028) (MTP IV), in which the Authority (Sacco Societies Regulatory Authority- SASRA) shall be fronting the SACCO subsector’s financial agenda of consolidating the regulatory and supervisory gains made over the last few years and releasing the Savings and Credit Co-operative Societies (SACCOs) potential as stable, effective, efficient and trust-worthy deposit-taking financial service providers.
In this agenda, investments by SACCOs in ICT, digital delivery channels and shared services will be the key game changer because members’ convenience and ease of access to financial services and products will continue to determine client or customer patronage. SACCOs must therefore move their financial products and services to the digital space; otherwise, the ever-growing techno-savvy demographic population will definitely look elsewhere for similar services. The eminent commencement of formal supervision of digital credit providers by the Central Bank of Kenya will add another layer of competition to SACCOs which will not have embraced the usage of ICT in financial services provision.
SACCOs must embrace consumer protection and fair treatment of customers equally as another key agenda that SACCOs must not only embrace if they hope to maintain the existing clientele but also if they are to attract new customers. Indeed, consumer protection and fair treatment of customers, which is the client (member) – focused, has over the last few years gained traction as an important core supervisory process, just like the traditional prudential supervision, which is largely institution-focused and shall therefore form the substratum of activities earmarked by the Authority for the MTP IV. In the meantime, the Authority has not been left behind in the universal supervisory policy shift toward consumer protection and fair treatment of clients. In that regard, it established and operationalised a market conduct functional department in its supervisory structure in 2021.
Supervisory and regulatory focus in the SACCO subsector must henceforth focus on consumer protection and fair treatment of customers.”
George Murathe, Chairman, Board of Directors (The SACCO Supervision Annual Report, 2021 Abridged Statement)
