Pawnshop vies for hard-pressed students

Pawnshop vies for hard-pressed students

JAKARTA (JP): The state-owned pawnshop company Perum Pegadaian plans to open stores right on the doorstep of its biggest clients -- inside university campuses, Antara reported.

In big cities like Bandung, "university students are our biggest clients", Ketut Sethyon, head of the company's research and development unit, said during a seminar in Bandung, West Java, on Saturday.

"They account for 38 percent of our clients," Ketut said at the seminar to discuss pawnshops as an alternative funding resource for students organized by state-run Padjadjaran University. "Then come workers, entrepreneurs, housewives and civil servants," he said.

He explained that the pawnshop company has been slow in setting up shops on campuses, while banks, post offices and telecommunication companies have all opened up branches there.

Ketut said the pawnshop company has a major image problem because it is still widely seen as a "poor man's" institution, not a respectable association that offers short term loans with low interest.

Many people, even students, are reluctant to admit their profession when filling in the forms to borrow money from pawn shops, he said.

He said the image was formed during the Dutch colonial rule, because pawnshops were then indeed for second class citizens because banks were strictly for the elite.

Haryo Martodirdjo, a Padjadjaran staff lecturer, stressed that most Indonesian university students are not mature enough to manage their finances.

Most still resort to borrowing from friends rather than turning to formal institutions like pawnshops, Haryo said. (emb)