Electronic payment (e-payment) transactions worth N203.35 trillion were carried out by banks between January and June 2019, Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) half-year e-payment figures have shown.
The data, released at the weekend, showed that the transactions occurred through cheques, Automated Teller Machines (ATMs), Point of Sale (PoS), m-Cash, CentralPay, Remita, Nigeria Interbank Instant Payment (NIBSS) Instant Payment (NIP), mobile money, among other channels.
The report showed that 3.4 million transactions valued at N2.2 trillion occurred through cheques; 504 million transactions worth N49.35 trillion through NIP; 424.5 million transactions worth N3.23 trillion through ATMs. PoS attracted 187.6 million transactions worth N1.39 trillion while web transfers attracted 47.9 million deals worth N223.9 billion.
Others are mobile money 104.7 million transactions worth N1.9 trillion and Remita’s 21.6 million transactions worth N9.8 trillion.
On annualised basis, the data showed that nine million cheques were issued in 2018 compared with 10 million in the preceding year; 875 million ATMs in 2018; 295 million PoS transactions in 2018, among other data.
The e-payment powers were conferred on the CBN by Sections 2 (d) and 47 (2) of the CBN Act, 2007, to promote and facilitate the development of efficient and effective systems for the settlement of transactions, including the development of electronic payment systems.
While pushing for the full use of the e-payment system, CBN Governor Godwin Emefiele said for Nigeria to actively play at the world stage, “our payment system must be successfully benchmarked against the global best practices, as in most developed nations of the world.”
He said e-payment provides safe and efficient mechanisms for making and receiving payments with minimum risks to the CBN, payment service providers and end-users.
To make the e-payment vision a success, the CBN, in collaboration with key stakeholders in the payments community, developed the National Payments Systems Vision 2020 (NPSV 2020). The NPSV 2020 is a sub-set of the Financial Systems Strategy 2020 (FSS 2020).
