Due to their low income, 8 million Colombians can't are unbanked and thus left out of the financial system, which means they don't have a commercial identity and are cut off from purchasing an array of goods. So we have created Payphone Bank, an OS with the ability to turn 13,000 existing Tigo-Une payphones into a micro-savings terminals. All the users have to do es open an account at a Une store ant their profile is immediately connected to a network which offers them basic goods, from public transport to essential appliances preciously out of their reach.

We have created a software that converts the existing 13,000 Une pay phones across Colombia into de facto digital banking terminals—with no hardware intervention. This feat is made possible by an Asterisk-based Voice Response System that controls the pay phones via DTMF tones. Users can activate an account at any Une store just by showing a photo ID. Then they can navigate the menus though an automated operator. Every coin they insert is added to their total balance. Through the voice activated menus they can manage their account, purchase basic products and services and even access micro-loans to buy essential appliances previously out of their reach. This technology has already been implemented across Colombia, allowing users to buy public transport tickets and pay for their data plans and utility bills. More features will be added to the software throughout 2017, expanding the possibilities por users.

Payphones are now being used an average 6,000 times a month for other activities aside from calling, like paying for electricity, making data recharges and buying public transport tickets, radically changing the way in which people engage with the brand and perceive pay phones.