Nigerian bank workers’ involvement in fraud on rise, report shows

More bank workers in Nigeria are taking advantage of their access to defraud customers, a report by FITC has established.

The report, which gave insights into fraudulent activities in Nigerian banks between April and June 2022, revealed that 19 employees of banks were sacked within the period due to their involvement in fraudulent activities.

The number of bank workers (19) who were sacked in Q2 2022 due to fraud represents a 90% increase compared to 10 recorded in Q1 2022, according to FITC.

A comparison of the data with the same quarter in 2021 showed an alarming 375% increase, as only 4 dismissals for fraud were recorded in Q2 2021.

With a total of N1.17 billion lost to frauds across 24 banks in Nigeria in the second quarter of 2022, 73 bank staff were reported to have been involved in the activities, a 27.6% increase when compared with 60 recorded in the first quarter of the year.

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The report gives credence to wide speculations that most fraudulent activities on bank customers’ accounts are carried out in connivance with bank staff.

With the recent ‘Japa’ trend hitting the IT departments of most Nigerian banks, there has been an increase in the number of bank customers losing their hard-earned money to fraud due to the technical lapses left by the brain drain.

Some banks’ insider sources have also fingered tech staff who are planning their exit for committing some of the atrocities to get enough money to fund their travel.

Recommendations for banks: While advising banks to put adequate measures in place to deter their staff from engaging in fraud, FITC said: “Given the growing number of employees involved in fraudulent activities, banks should exercise extra caution when employing new staff or contracting an outsourcing firm for employment.

“As a measure to curb the involvement of staff in fraudulent activities, staff who have also acted with high integrity in circumstances in which they would have acted otherwise should be duly commended and rewarded for their actions; this sends a positive message to other staff and they too would want to be recognised and rewarded as well.”

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