Claire Alexandre, Senior Program Officer, The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, USA Branchless Banking allows customers to access financial services beyond bank branches and thereby holds the promise of addressing two major hurdles to financial inclusion: lack of proximity and high costs. It builds on the sustained development of mobile telecommunications which makes it possible for the banking sector to embrace indirect distribution and for new mobile money services to reach otherwise unbanked customers. Banking beyond branches means newer partnerships to help poor people address the pain point of cash: by having better access to electronic transactions, access to all formal financial services becomes more convenient.