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• Lamentations as bank customers’ funds remain trapped months after
By Vivian Onyebukwa
Early this year, the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), headed by Godwin Emefiele introduced the redesigned bank notes and phased out some old currencies such as N200, N500 and N1000 denominations. The action, which came with the cashless policy of the past administration, experienced incredible glitches and glaring challenges in terms of implementation because of the discomfort it brought to the people who could hardly access their funds.
Since customers had difficulties accessing their funds from the banks, they resorted to patronising the commercial Point of Service (POS) operators. Many were the POS operators that made a kill at the time, as they became lords of the manor. They charged astronomical amounts for each little transaction, smiling their way to the banks while most Nigerians bewailed.
One of the challenges experienced then was poor network service from the banks. With the suddenness of the policy, and the fact that many hitherto unbanked Nigerians were forced to open bank accounts, many banks’ information technology department found it extremely hard coping with the pressure of attending to millions of new customers. So they started experiencing poor network service.
Since then, depositors have continued to lament how their funds were trapped in various banks as a of poor network services. Till date, many of the depositors had not received their money back from the banks.
Some of the bank customers, whose money was trapped at the time, are lamenting that their money had remained trapped in different banks. And there are no hopes of ever getting their money back. When the reporter visited some commercial banks in Lagos, it was discovered that some customers were still visiting banks to complain of trapped funds that occurred months back. And to show that it is actually a serious matter, some of the banks have established complaint rooms where these issues are being taken care of.
On inquiry at one of the commercial banks in Ikotun, Lagos on how one’s trapped funds could be retrieved, a security personnel, while directing Saturday Sun said: “You are the fourth person with this kind of complaint so far this morning. Just sit down and wait for your turn to enter the complaints room.”
Relating her experience, Joy Amadi, a petty trader narrated her ordeal. “I sent N2,000 to my son who was trapped somewhere and needed transport money. I went to the POS to do the transaction. The money was debited from my account, but it did not get into my son’s account. I had to send him another N2,000 through the same POS operator. The money had the same problem. Till today the funds were never reversed. I had to make trouble with the POS operator who decided to pay me back with her own funds to avoid any further complications with me.”
Amadi described the situation as frustrating, wondering why nothing works in Nigeria.
Another victim, Mary Ezekiel, a trader too, said she transferred N10,000 to someone through POS during the cashless policy, which had yet to deliver to the person’s account, and has never been reserved to her own account. “I have gone to the bank on several occasions without success. I have now have given up,” she stated.
“I transferred 15,000 to my customer for items I bought from her during that cashless policy. The money was deducted from my account, but my customer said the money did not get to her account. I was referred to my bank to reverse the money. For confirmation, my bank printed my statement of account which showed that the money was deducted from my account, but my customer is insisting that the money did not get to her account. Till now, I have not been able to recover my money,” a woman who simply identified herself as It’s Sikira, said.
It has been lamentations by bank customers all the way. An editor of a popular Nigerian newspaper (name withheld) told Saturday Sun how he lost so much money during the cashless policy. “I lost a lot of money during the period of that ill-conceived cash redesign imbroglio. On many occasions, my bank accounts got debited but the other parties were never credited, so I had to pay twice.
“On one occasion, I sent money to someone in the office to buy fuel for me. The fellow was beside me while I sent the money, but the money never got into his account. Yet my account was debited. I had to send him another amount. Till date, the transaction wasn’t reversed.
“On yet another occasion, I bought food somewhere and paid. Two days later, the people called me that the money was never credited. So I had to pay again. Another loss.
“How many of such incidents can one even remember? What about taxi rides? You would pay the driver but a day later, he would call you that he never got the money. You had to pay twice. It was frustrating. The initiators of that policy should spend time in jail,” he told
A clearing agent in Lagos, Boniface Nwaogu, equally narrated how he tried to transfer money to a pastor who gave him cash during the cashless policy, but the pastor complained that he did not receive the money in his account. This happened on February 25th, 2023.
“I sent the receipt from my App, an evidence of transfer of the money that said my transaction was successful, but to my greatest surprise, that money was hanging for a long time. So I had to go to the bank involved to lay complaint. They promised to reach their head office, which they did not, yet there was no evidence that the money had dropped. What surprised me much is that even this pastor’s daughter is a senior staff of the bank. The pstor kept on disturbing me, so I had to do additional transfer which he received, but the one I did on the February 25 this year was still hanging.”
According to Nwaogu, his visits to the bank on more than four occasions had not yielded any result. “They were still telling me the same story. So by the second week of June, I still had to go to the bank to find out what actually happened. After checking the account number from which I transferred the money, the bank manager discovered that the money had entered the pastor’s account the same day. So I asked them to give me the evidence showing that the money went into the pastor’s account, which they did. I then gave it to the pastor and asked him to go to his bank and demand for statement of his account.”
Nwogu described the whole process as frustrating, saying the cashless policy has its merits and demerits.
Another victim, Ngozi Okpalakunne, a media consultant said during the cashless policy, she withdrew N6,000 from her bank account using POS. Her account, she said, was debited, a development that was confirmed by the POS operator, but the POS operator did not give her cash saying the money was trapped. Okpalakunne said she expected the money to bounce back into her account after some days, but it did not.
Hear her: “The amount I collected was N5,000, but her charges totalled N1,000. Till today, I have not received that money. I have gone there several times to make complaints. They took my details, but till now, nothing has been done about it. Their response was that the money is still hanging. The question I keep asking everyone at the bank, but which no one has bothered to answer is, where is the money hanging?”
