The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) in order to make life better for investors as it is regards to bills payments by the investors, has introduced regulatory guidelines aimed at protecting stakeholders in the system. Among other things, the regulation mandates billers and payment service providers to provide customer support services by creating help desks to aid resolution of services issues.
CBN disclosed that the scope of the regulation, titled, “Regulation for Bill Payments in Nigeria,” covers bill payments on various payment channels and any payment platform that seeks to integrate the payment side of commercial activity and merchant aggregators in Nigeria.
It further said that the payment methods include Cheques, Cards, Direct Debit, Instant Payments, and Automated Clearing House, etc.
Explaining the purpose of the regulation, the apex bank stated: “The objectives of this regulation are to document the minimum standards that must be complied with for the processing of bill payment transactions; to identify stakeholders in Bill Payment system space; to ensure achievement of the vision of a ‘nationally utilized and international recognized’ payments system in Nigeria; to ensure adequate protection for the stakeholders in the Bill Payment system space.”
CBN also noted that the regulation identified five stakeholders in the bills payment system, namely: the payer, the biller, the payer’s bank, the biller’s bank, and the Payment Service Provider (PSP).
Meanwhile, the CBN and other stakeholders in the financial sector on Thursday deliberated on ways to ensure financial inclusion of additional 7.6 million Nigerians in 2018.
The CBN Deputy Governor, Financial System Stability, Okwu Nnanna, at the Financial Inclusion State Steering Committee (FISSCO) Regional Capacity Building Programme in Abuja, said all stakeholders were important in achieving the set target.
“The vulnerable segments in our society remain a major concern for financial inclusion as they constitute a large proportion of the excluded population.
“For instance, in Nigeria, the proportion of females without access to formal financial services was 46.3 per cent in 2016 compared to 36.8 per cent of men.
“In addition, a world disability study on people living with disability showed that 25 million Nigerians were living with one form of disability or the other and this acts as a hindrance to accessing basic financial products and services.
“In addition to women and people with disabilities, vulnerable segments can further include youth, rural communities and Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) and they all should form part of our focus,’’ he said.
Mr. Nnanna recommended that to improve access to financial services, affordable savings, credit payment, insurance and pension products should be designed, targeted at the vulnerable groups in the society.
