Amdocs (NASDAQ: DOX), provider of customer experience solutions, has announced the findings on a consumer and service provider survey. It showed that mobile financial service (MFS) providers do not fully realize the potential of loyalty programmes from which they can avail of financially. 80 % of unbanked users are not enrolled in any loyalty programmes at all.

The survey, which was commissioned by Amdocs and conducted by analyst and consultancy firm Ovum, focused on banked and unbanked users of MFS worldwide. It surveyed 1,800 consumers and 42 service providers across 9 countries in emerging and mature markets including the United States, Singapore, Russia, Brazil, Indonesia, Mexico, the Philippines, Bangladesh, and Vietnam.

Further survey findings:

·         Ability to manage multiple loyalty cards using a single mobile wallet is the most important feature—but not well supported by service providers: The overwhelming majority of respondents consider it very important (61%) or important (34%) to be able to manage different loyalty cards via a single wallet. However, only 33% of service providers offer this feature. The other important feature that consumers want is the ability to share loyalty points with friends and family.

·         Tiered loyalty programmes drive greater mobile wallet usage: Only half of service providers offer tiered loyalty programs. Of these, 79% said that the prospect of earning higher tier points incentivises customers to use their services more. Consumers however, still lack awareness of such programmes, with 19% saying they didn’t know if their loyalty programme was tiered.

·         Consumers like to accumulate loyalty points to purchase products and services or to receive cash discounts: Although there is a marked preference for cash back (41%), this type of reward was not available to one-third of respondents. The same holds true for vouchers, where 30% wanted to receive such rewards but only 22% were offered them.

·         MFS-linked loyalty programs represent a highly untapped market: 56% of respondents were not members of an MFS-linked loyalty program. One-third of these were not offered any such programme. Of unbanked respondents, who stand to benefit most from MFS-linked loyalty programmes, only 22% said they were registered to one.

As the solution, Amdocs launches MFS Loyalty Management System that helps service providers to build, launch, and manage loyalty programmes. “It simplifies the consumer experience, while helping service providers retain and engage existing customers, attract new ones and increase mobile wallet usage,” comments Patrick McGrory, division president for Amdocs’ Emerging Offerings.