According to the Director, Banking and Payment System Department, Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), Mr. ‘Dipo Fatokun, a total of 23,345,964 million bank customers had obtained their Bank Verification Numbers (BVN) as at February 7, 2016.
The bank verification number is a centralised biometric identification system for the banking industry, launched by the bankers’ committee, to complement the existing means of customer identification, which include: the driver’s license; the international passport; the national identity card; and the permanent voter’s card.
The CBN official disclosed this recently at a conference organised for members of the Finance Correspondents Association of Nigeria (FICAN), in Ibadan. He also mentioned in his presenattion that over 28,303,332 customers’ BVN, out of the existing 55,316,040 customers in all the banks in Nigeria, had been linked to their respective bank accounts.
He stated that the initiative had started yielding the desired results, with the reported elimination of 23,000 ghost workers at the Federal Government level.
Mr Fatokun also mentioned that 2015 saw an unprecedented upsurge in the volume and value of transactions across all payment channels in the industry, compared to 2014. Specifically, the volume of e-payment transactions was put at 162,598,740 with a value of N48,932,506,699,512.20; compared with a volume of 113,421,933, and value of N43,857,678,478,941.30 in 2014.
He expressed satisfaction that the BVN initiative had started yielding the desired effects, with the reported elimination of 23,000 ghost workers at the federal government level.
“The absence of a unique identifier in the Nigerian banking industry has been a major challenge, inhibiting the effectiveness of the know-your-customer (KYC) principle, with negative consequences on the growth of credit cards and other credit-related products.
