Calls for Applications

RfA: Development of a Mobile Application for Financial Education in West Africa

  • July 17, 2018

  • Calls for Applications

Summary

UNCDF is seeking applications from qualified technical partners (e.g. The partner firm or organization will be tasked to develop a platform which meets the contextual needs of the four (4) YouthStart Expansion countries (The Gambia, Guinea, Niger and Senegal). The application should be designed for trainers at FSPs level but also for final young clients on their own devices with the option (where applicable) to be linked to an e-wallet system of a partner financial institution. Content for the financial training modules will be provided by UNCDF and the partner financial institution.

Duration

The technical partner is expected to sign a Performance Based Financing (Grant) Agreement with UNCDF (Applicants not familiar with UNCDF agreements are encouraged to request a sample from youthstart@uncdf.org prior to submission of application). The duration of the grant agreement will be 30 months.

Agreement size

Up to US$300,000 for the whole project. Applicants should provide budgets indicating the cost per stage (as depicted above) per country and how they would allocate costs to produce high quality results with their technical approach.

Submission of the Application

  • Applications and any consultation about this RfA should be submitted via email at youthstart@uncdf.org
  • Questions regarding this RfA will be accepted until 13 July 2018
  • The subject line of the email should be: Mobile Application for Financial Education YS-E
  • Applications can be submitted in either English or French
  • The deadline to submit the applications is 18 July 2018 at 17.00 GMT

Frequently Asked Questions

How many different operators are you working within each country? Can you share who they are at this time?

Probably 1 or 2. They will be selected according to an open call the will happen in Q4.

eWallets are configured very differently for different telcos. Can we see a description of the eWallets you are considering in each country?

This will be defined based on an RFA

Full integration may be difficult due to privacy laws around accessing eWallet information of users by an FSP. Can you explain what behavior or outcome you are expecting with the integration?

Integration will vary according to national regulation. The objective will be a Fin Edu App that allows users e.g. to set saving goals that can have a direct impact on their savings account. In the best case scenario, the app will be linked to a savings account in an MFI. However, there are countries (ie Niger) where that may not be feasible. So in that case, we are talking about just an application that people download in their phones and that field officers can use for training purposes.

Do both systems (i.e. app for tracking savings behaviors and eWallet) have to be integrated? Alternatively, can they be operating separately with mechanisms to track and verify actions on either side?

Full integration is desirable but will vary according to national regulation. Alternative track system will be applied if regulation does not allow integration.

Would it be okay for the Applicant to potentially focus only on the scope for building the application that tracks youth saving behavior for FSPs while the integration with the eWallet and the App is managed by a third party vendor?

Third parties are allowed but have to be specified in the RfA section 3.4. The Applicant will be responsible of such relation.

Could you also please specify whether the provided budget limit of $300,000 is inclusive or exclusive of any applicable taxes and whether the proposals exceeding the limit would still be considered?

UN agencies are tax-exempt. Unfortunately, proposals exceeding the limit will not be considered.

Can we get a general sense of the volume of content that is to be digitized? How many training modules? How many skills will the end-user clients be trained on?

Volumes of contents depend on the country. Training modules are provided by UNCDF and the FSP partners in each country (they have not been selected yet).

Should we assume that the selected partner must operate completely independently? Or can we rely on some available resources in each country from either UNCDF or FSP - such as research licenses, field staff to help with testing and research as needed, offices and facilities if needed, etc? This will make a big budget impact.

The selected candidate will work with the FSP and UNCDF to design the App according to the country context. FSPs will have a focal point for the Fin Edu and will support to test the App with clients. Facilities are not included.

Does the app for the FSP trainers and young clients have to be the same app?

It depends on your approach.

How do the e-wallet linkages work? What is the partner financial institution and how have they integrated in the past?

The institutions have not yet been selected. Where applicable, the App should allow users to set saving goals that are directly linked to their eWallet at the FI.

Does the app require any particular features beyond what is in the documentation?

Main features are explained in the RfA. The App will need to be adapted to the context of the 4 countries.

Do we need to scrape data from their phones to determine savings, or will the e-wallet linkages help us get that data?

The selected partner will work to link the FSPs e-wallet system (if available) to the platform which will allow the FSP to track youths’ savings behaviour. It has to be a collaboration between App Developer and FSP to exchange the data needed.

For the M&E system on savings tracking, can we get this directly from the bank system or will we need to communicate with the user phones to be able to pull this data?

If the App will be integrated to the App, the platform needs to track whether Fin Edu has an impact on actual saving behaviour.

Does content type vary by country; what types of content do you envisage having?

Contents need to be adapted to country need (as explained in the RfA). E.g. different cultural contexts like local language.

How important is IOS compatibility? Is this mandatory or if we see usage is sufficiently low, will not having IOS or using a web-app suffice?

IOS compatibility is desirable.

Is content static or will the app content be dynamically populated?

The App has to be dynamic. The selected candidate will be in charge of community management, meaning that they will update and disseminate contents in order to keep youth engaged.

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