Joseph Okia

Okia Joseph received loan money worth $800 raised from Kiva to WITEP.

He was too happy and grateful for the loan money received.

He has already put loan money into the business.

We are grateful for your positive response towards his request.

This loan has been refunded for the following reason:

As you may be aware, each business on Kiva's website is posted by one of Kiva's 60+ Field Partners in 39 developing countries. A Field Partner is an independent microfinance institution that has a history of lending to the poor for a social purpose. They screen each entrepreneur, post his/her profile on the Kiva website, and administer your loan.

Kiva routinely audits each Field Partner to ensure your loan is being dutifully administered to the entrepreneur you've selected. In the course of auditing our Field Partner, Women's Initiative to Eradicate Poverty (WITEP) in Uganda, Kiva discovered that some entrepreneurs were not receiving the full amount of their loans.

This violates Kiva's policies and we have terminated our relationship with WITEP. All of the loans made to entrepreneurs served by this Field Partner have been refunded. We hope you realize that our audit uncovered a true exception to the norm; the vast majority of our Field Partners administer your loans with the highest integrity. Kiva will continue to audit Field Partners to ensure your loan is being dutifully administered and to make our website a model for transparency in international development.

To help inform your choice of Field Partner as well as entrepreneur, we have launched a new feature on the site which helps you evaluate the Field Partner's performance in your lending decision. See www.kiva.org/about/partners/ for details.

We hope that you give lending to the working poor another chance by re-lending your Kiva Credit to a new entrepreneur on our site.