Awareness about financial services such as insurance among women, and especially those in the 18-35 age bracket, grew to 29% in 2022 but consumption is still below 1 %, a new study said.
Among insurance, they prefer life insurance and health, it added.
The findings are based on the inputs from 5,000 retail stores where women in this age group availed of financial transactions.
The survey was done by Reserve Bank Innovation Hub, an RBI subsidiary that enables frictionless finance, and digital payment network Paynearby.
The survey also found that cash withdrawal, mobile recharges and bill payments are the top three services availed by women at such retail stores. Other preferred services include PAN card applications, entertainment, e-commerce and travel.
For women the biggest saving goals are their children’s education with over 68% of them citing good education for their kids as a priority for them, savings for medical emergencies and buying household electronic items.
The study added that cash continues to hold strong, with around 48 % of the women in the survey preferring to deal in cash.
At the same time, UPI has seen good growth in adoption among women, with preferences ranging from 5-20 %. Credit cards continue to have little to no recall and usage by women, the survey said.
According to the survey, over 75% of retailers said women within the 18-40 age group are the most digitally adept, with over 60 % of them owning smartphones and accessing digital content through them.
Around 78% of women cited cash withdrawal as the primary reason for visiting a retail store for financial transactions.
The report further said while more than 74% of women operate their bank accounts themselves, they are primarily for the purpose of cash withdrawals and cash deposits. Interestingly, for more than 20%, it is their husbands who operate their bank accounts, the study added.
Meanwhile, a report by Anarock stated that at least 65% of women respondents of their survey said they prefer to invest in real estate, followed by 20% favouring the stock markets and 8% of them in gold.
The report added that 83% of women respondents are looking at homes priced above Rs 45 lakh. Affordable homes under this price are the least preferred, the report said. Read more
(With PTI inputs)
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