Three days after the February 10 deadline of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) on the swap of the redesigned N200, N500 and N1,000 notes, PoS operators have continued to sell the old notes as the scarcity of the new notes remained unabated in Lagos. This was more so as many commercial banks continued to shut down their ATM Galleries and full banking hall services to their customers. Only few provide skeletal services of paying limited amount of money to their customers either through the ATM or on the counter in the banking hall.
National Daily visited some banks in Agege, Ogba, Ikeja and the environs, and noticed that very few banks dispensed money through the ATM for limited amount of N10,000 for customers of the bank, and N5,000 for customers of other banks. Among the banks were Keystone, Stanbic IBTC, along Oba Akran Road, Ikeja. Stanbic while paying through the ATM, also paid its customers at the counter in the banking hall. This lasted briefly for about 30 minutes and less than 40 persons were paid.
At Keystone Bank, less than 90 persons were paid cash at the ATM gallery.
National Daily discovered that at both banks, the staff were the first to withdraw money from the ATM as soon as they were “loaded”; no customer was allowed to use the ATM until they were satisfied.
Few other banks like Zenith, Access, UBA, First Bank, etc, at some of their branches were sighted receiving cash deposit from customers.
At Parallex Bank, Olowu, customers were paid parallel amount of N5,000 each at the counter in the banking hall. the ATM gallery was shut down. National Daily on investigation found that the bank paid over 170 customers before the close of work.
While no official of the bank could explain the reason for restricting dispensation of cash to customers through the counter, some of the customers told National Daily that the bank may have decided making payment only through the counter because the ATM was opened to customers of all banks and that most users abused the service. They complained that some users were coming to the bank with multiple ATM cards of several banks to withdraw money from the bank, and distorting the idea of the money getting to everybody. Some other customers also told National Daily that making payment on the counter in the banking hall was the only way to ensure that only customers of the bank enjoy the service of provision of money during this Naira notes scarcity period in the country.
Though, commending Parallex Bank for their consistency in operating their ATM gallery daily since the CBN new monetary policy, some customers expressed the fear that last week, they were allowed to withdraw N20,000 per day, then, N10,000 on Monday, but N5,000 on Tuesday, adding concerns that the decli9ne should bot continue to N2,000 daily withdrawal limit.
Meanwhile, several PoS operators in Ikeja and its environs were still selling the old Naira notes at N1,000 for N5,000, that is N200 for N1,000, and the patronage was high as that was the easiest source of cash to many.