Naira design crisis: Transfer records missing in banks

The adoption of transfers in payment for goods and services since the Naira redesign crisis in Nigeria is beginning to cost bank customers the risk of losing their funds in bank deposits. Several traders who went to the bank to confirm the transfers they received from various customers were shocked the banks do not have records of a number of transfers made for payments by those who purchased goods.

A female food seller in the suburb of Ikeja, narrating her ordeal to National Daily, said that she went to the bank to confirm the transfer of the previous week but was surprised that many of the transactions were not in the records of the bank, even after she received alert.

According to her, the bank told her that they don’t have those records, and could only confirm few. The bank, therefore, advised that the woman should go to the POS operator to cross-check her transactions and that the POS operator should also go to her bank for details of her transactions for the period of the transfers.

Another female trader also told National Daily that her bank cannot account for transfers made to her for seven days of transactions. She was told that the transfers did not get to the bank and that she should go to reconcile with the POS operator.

Both women said that they began to reject transfers through telephones when they could not trust most of the transfers done by some customers. They resolved to accept transfers done only through POS, lamenting that the POS is now causing problems.

Also, many drivers reject transfer for payment on transit, saying it is not reliable. A driver complained that 24 hours after, he was yet to receive transfers of the previous day. Thus, he rejected passengers who wanted to do transfers on the trip.

There had been complaints of ‘network’ outage since the transfer episode began. Many people in some days find it difficult to transfer funds, even at ATM galleries in Lagos, including telephones. The POS has been the most flexible and reliable transfer channels overtime, but now becoming a problem to the end receivers.

The shortage of cash has continued to get severe in the country since the banks mopped up the redesigned N1,000 and N500 notes on the directive of the Central Bank of Nigeria, without corresponding supply of the new notes. The N200 redesigned note is only allowed by President Muhammadu Buhari to remain legal tender till April 10. However, the new N200 notes are not provided to replace the outgoing N200 notes, despite the deadline set by the President on the advice of the CBN.

Naira notes has since become commodities that Nigerians purchase with the same naira notes to pay for goods and services. The federal government has transformed Naira from legal tender to commodity, selling at N1,500 for N5,000; and Nigerians are losing money in millions daily on the aggregate.  To purchase N10,000, a citizen would have to either signoff N13,000, to receive the N10,000 cash; or loses N3,000 and be given N7,000 cash by the seller.