Over 20 million customers have been enrolled by Deposit Money Banks in the ongoing Bank Verification Number exercise, the Nigeria Inter Bank Settlement System Plc has said.
This came barely seven weeks to the October 31, 2015 deadline set by the Central Bank of Nigeria. The CBN had initially given bank customers June 30, 2015 to do biometric registration with banks and obtain their BVN.
The central bank, however, extended the deadline to enable more customers to get their BVN.
The 20 million customers registered by banks means about 8.6 million are yet to obtain their BVN.
Data by the Enhancing Financial Innovation Access, an organisation committed to financial inclusion, has indicated that there are about 28.6 million adult bank accounts in Nigeria.
The NIBSS in a statement on Sunday, however, expressed assurance that more customers would register in coming weeks.
As part of the efforts to achieve success in the exercise, the organisation said it had collaborated with telecoms firms to create a platform through which bank customers could confirm their registration status.
The statement said, “The NIBSS has collaborated with one of the country’s telecoms service providers, Etisalat to roll out the BVN Query Service.
“The service, which was unveiled at our headquarters recently, is designed to help the banking Nigerian public Query their BVN on-the-go via their mobile phones.
The Managing Director, NIBSS, Ade Shonubi, was quoted as saying that the partnership initiative was in response to growing public demand for confirmation of the BVN status of customers who had enrolled on the platform.
The Chief Marketing Officer, Etisalat Nigeria, Mr. Francesco Angelone, said its partnership with the NIBSS was in line with the company’s commitment to continue to create value for the consumers across all sectors including the banking and telecoms industries.
(Punch)
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