11.22.2012 User Meetup
Ed Cable
Owned by Ed Cable
Agenda
Before each meeting we'll post a proposed agenda. You can add any item you would like to cover to the agenda by emailing the user list or editing this wiki page.
Session | Description | Presenter | Time |
|---|---|---|---|
Introduction | We will also have an introduction of everyone on the call so the community can get more personally connected. | Ed Cable | 5 min |
Implementer Show & Tell | Kongalend - Semba Funda | Semba Funda | 20 min |
| Discussion | Security in general | Ed/Lukasz | 10 min |
Demo/Tutorial | Demo of Mifos X Maker/Checker Workflow | Keith | 20 min |
| Open Office Hours | Support/feedback | 5 min |
On the Call
- Keith Woodlock (COSM - Ireland)
- Lassaad (enda - Tunisia)
- Vishwas (Conflux - Bangalore)
- Praveen (GK - India)
- Semba (Kongalend - Namibia)
- Tshoombe (Kongalend - Namibia)
- Lukasz (SolDevelo - Poland)
- Praveen (Hugo - India)
- Madhukar (Hugo - India)
- Miguel (SBS - Mozambique)
- Natu (Afrisis - Mozambique)
- Marco (Quipu - Peru)
- Kakha (FINA - Georgia)
- Amit (Digamber - India)
- John Woodlock (COSM - Ireland)
- Ed Cable (COSM - USA)
Notes
From: http://sync.in/xIvYFDy2tt
Agenda
- Security Discussion (follow-up from Summit)
- User Presentation from Semba Funda of Kongalend
- Demo of Maker/Checker workflow in Mifos X
Kongalend Presentation
- Development-centered MFI based in Windhoek, Namibia - promoting financial inclusion
Why Mifos?
- Most software using before - had high license fees including per-user cost fees just to do standard transactions in the system - became very costly as portfolio grew.
- Available support was poor - one-man shop behind the scenes
- Didn't support future growth where they wanted to move ahead.
How they Implemented
- Led by Miguel and Natu from Mozambique
- 1.5 months including customization.
- Miguel and Natu traveled all the way from MOzambique to get requirements analysis together
- Was a little challenging because this was first time with this process
Challenges
- Migration from previous system to Mifos
- Natu developed script to extract from database into Mifos
- Support for debit-order collection system where most of payments come in from
- Bank collects money from clients and then upload data from that banking platform.
- Distance challenges
- Internet connectivity was a fairly big challenge
- Accounting - integration with Pastel - interface between the 2 systems.
- Challenges with allocating payments
- Operational Challenges
- Reporting - unable to extract aging summary for a specific time period - like to know which client in arrears, how many months so they can follow up.
Mifos Benefits
- Ability to customize products with the help of specialist
- Upgrading to Mifos 2.5 in the next year - many of current challenges will be addressed in the upgrade.
Advice for Others
- For Specialists to get all the requirement gathering correct and explicitly explain them so everyone on same page - avoid future misunderstandings, etc.
Kongalend's Current Focus (Tshoombe & Emmanuel)
- These three are the key drivers of Mifos adoption in the organization - make sure tools for informatino provision are properly configred to respond to needs.
- Regulatory Compliance - broadenin service offering in terms of range of products they're offering - want correct mix of products and only report level of uptake - group, individual, agribusiness, housing loans, launching savings products as they get licensed to accept deposit
- Reporting is ever more critical - need accurate reporting on loan officer performance, branch performance, product uptake
- Would like update in Pentaho Reporting for PAR in terms of date, time, amount - essential for risk management.
Question/Answer
- Challenges with current Pentaho report - need to have a timeline view (i.e account in arrear by one month, if two months - take another action). Need to characterize and segment the PAR to take action so don't lose the whole customer)
- Input from Miguel:
- One of our major implementations - very proud to take help from community - on this next implementation - will be using efforts of hugo technologies to map accounting transactions from Mifos to Pastel.
- Joint efforts with our team, help from community as they begin upgrade in January.
Security in Mifos and Demo for Maker/Checker
- Security in general for Mifos X
- Currently have typical authentication and security elements in Mifos X - dependent on if it's run locally or in cloud
- Maker/Checker
- View it more as a process/workflow feature
- Will improve data quality and control
- Philosophy - have role of maker and checker - with intermediary layer
- With Mifos X - for any state in the system you could add the extra maker/checker approval step
- this also came up when you needed transactions coming in from external sources like SMS
- Today - very small demo of starting up doing and will be implementing as core design/feature of Mifos X.
- Currently only around the create/edit/delete client area
- Over time will add the maker/checker workflow around any permission.
- Any where you change data/make a transaction - will have queue-based maker/checker system in place.
- Demo
- Create client - when 'maker-checker' enabled for this task it goes into queue.
- Queue shows tasks and then links to review/take action (i.e. approve) - have done reject/modify scenarios yet wait to see what people think.
- Edit Client - when 'maker-checker' enabled for this task, it detects what changes are and queues the task.
- If someone was to look at the client details screen it would show the client details and also the fact that there are changes 'queued' for this client
- At present this is just a highlight in red box with the number of changes queued - can present whatever level of detail here i guess - interested in what people think should see here.
- When you view the 'proposed changes' after an edit/update - it shows all the details of the client and highlights fields where the 'differences' are
- Interested in feedback
- What rules people want to put around maker-checker process e.g. ability to restrict the person who creates or makes from also doing the 'checking' or approval
- What queues would like to see?
- Queue of all items I as a user can 'approve' or check
- Queue of all items I as a user created but have not yet been 'approved' or checked
- System-wide to turn off/on and granular to turn off or on for any specific area.
- Questions
- Praveen: Any change log for maker/checker in Mifos X?
- Yes will support full audit trail.
- Amit: Will the concept be based on financial transaction and non financial transactions
- Yes, any data that goes into system can be maker-checkerized.
- Natu: will it replace current approval process in Mifos 2.0 (i.e. partial application)
- This will complement that so you could have both there side by side or separate - i.e. maker/checker could work on top of loan approval workflow.