The Central Bank of Nigeria has made emergency phone numbers available to the general public so that they can report dishonest Point of Sales operators who are selling new naira notes and those who are charging excessive withdrawal fees.
This was announced by the Director of the CBN Governor’s Department, Joseph Omayuku, during a press conference with journalists in Yenagoa, the capital of Bayelsa State.
Omayuku asked the public to report errant PoS agents by contacting the CBN contact center at 07002255226; Telephones Ext: 711025 – 7; [email protected]; and its social media accounts.
She also warned syndicates participating in illicit operations to stop immediately.
Many Nigerians are refusing to accept the old notes as legal cash due to the dearth of the new naira notes, and several state governors have decided to sue the federal government for the difficulties their states are facing.
Despite the difficulties associated with the redesign policy, banks’ online payment platforms continue to face reports of glitches that cause transactions to fail.
According to observers, the problems arise because digital platforms are not robust enough to handle the current boom in electronic transactions as consumers turn to online payments as a result of the lack of cash.
Online payment problems are cited as a cause by those who reject them.
However, the CBN representative rejected the comparison, maintaining that it is “not as bad as to warrant rejection of transfer payments.”
In the meantime, the CBN governor, stated to the Diplomatic Corps on Tuesday that it was not essential to extended the February 10 deadline for the distribution of the revised N200, N500, and N1,000 notes.
He warned that such people will be sanctioned along with Point of Sales, or POS, operators that impose high fees on clients and blamed the shortage of the new notes on the actions of some dishonest bankers and members of the community who were attempting to sabotage the policy.
In his words: “PoS agents who are supposed to help are getting involved in these activities.
‘’We have EFCC, ICPC working with our monitoring team to arrest any PoS agent that charges any fee because we have made it clear that whatever is their fee, which is not meant to be more than N200 for any amount you exchange that we, CBN, will pay as part of our effort to lessen the burden of this problem.”
