Banks set new transfer limit for domiciliary account holders

Some commercial banks in the country have started sending new foreign exchange transfer limits to their customers with domiciliary accounts.

Emails sent to some customers reveal banks are informing customers that they can only deposit $5,000 in cash into their accounts monthly. They also advised the customers to transfer electronically instead of cash deposits.

One of the banks also indicated that cash deposits are no longer allowed for some account holders.

“There is a $5,000 monthly cash deposit limit. We encourage you to make more deposits via electronic transfers. Cash funded transfers to beneficiaries with accounts in other banks in Nigeria are no longer allowed.

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“There will be no restriction to the frequency or value of transactions for accounts funded through inflows but supporting documents are required before payments are processed. Cash deposits are no longer allowed for Wealth Management Investments.”

Some of these rules are actually not new as they contain forex transaction guidelines issued by the central bank last year as part of its efforts to curtail demand for forex and reduce the utilization of the banking system to facilitate black market dealing in forex.

You cannot deposit more than $5,000 cash monthly (cumulative) into your bank domiciliary accounts. However, you can deposit more than this if it is an electronic transfer. This is a lot more difficult to achieve for retail buyers of forex and the exchange rate is often higher.

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You are also required to provide supporting documents backing the inflow of dollars into your account especially if the transfers are from one personal account to another.

Last week, the CBN announced it was indefinitely extending its Naira 4-dollar scheme for diaspora remittances which was introduced in March, suggesting the program may have achieved success by its standards.