Terms-and-Condition Robbery


What banking, as an industry, and the bank, as an institution, represent on pages of business and finance/management textbooks are different from what is practically obtainable in Nigeria and probably some countries in the world. To all customers of banks in Nigeria, every cash deposited in their accounts is vulnerable to any category of deduction, either acceptable or otherwise to the account holder. In fact, mysterious or magical deductions of funds is not a strange thing to more than 99% of bank account holders in this part of the world.
A screen shoot copy of the email from Access Bank Plc.
For the banks, members of their managements have become specialists in the creation of excuses for stealing. However, to have such deductions well packaged and legitimately coloured in corporate garments, the name of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) must be associated with it. With phrases like “as directed by the Central Bank of Nigeria…” and “the CBN has directed all banks...,” every banking Nigerian, particular the over 98% of the struggling population, shall be the prey of the banks. Therefore, the CBN is the justifier of all covertly designed charges which are paid for by you and me. If the instructions from the CBN is the basis for all unacceptable deductions, then would it not be logical for the CBN to be the only customer of the banks?

On June 22, 2020, Access Bank Plc. sent an email to me (please carefully read the underlines areas). Based on the instruction, the bank has activated a plan to deduct FIFTY NAIRA for all inflows into my account (this applies to all customers) as long as the amount is more than 10,000 naira (transferred or paid in cash) but the account needs to be funded so that such charges could be effected on all transactions from February 1, 2020 to April 30, 2020.

When I read the email, I asked myself some logical questions. If all fund transfers are not free of charges from all originating banks, why should the receiving bank charge the customer, as long as the transfer is within Nigeria? If “stamp duty” actually means “a duty levied on the legal recognition of a certain document,” is cash payment into a bank account not different from a document? What is/are the differences between a document and a transaction? Is the Central Bank of Nigeria so poor that bank customers must be exploited, squeezed, impoverished and robbed legitimately for the funding of the apex bank?

If cashless policy remains the anthem of the CBN, as it has been since the days of Lamido Sanusi Lamido, a former governor of the institution, why are the banks, particularly Access Bank Plc., empowered to squeeze cash out of us, especially during this period of no payment of palliative by the so-called government to the people? If the CBN is not interested in the pains, sufferings, cries, unemployment, wasting talents, abandoned manpower and the backward developments, which this so-called “stamp duty” would have on struggling entrepreneurs in Nigeria, then it would be logical to rename the CBN as the Central Bank of Bank Owners. Also, the covert methods of fund deduction should be described as “stealing-by-trick methodology.”

 Is it only in Nigeria that customers must pay for the property that belongs to a bank or electricity distribution companies? Whether the answer is “yes” or “no,” it should be known, without argument, that things that are obtainable in this country are opposites of what banking entails in the European Union or Canada. In such territories, issuance of ATM card is free. ATM maintenance charge does not exist; not even a monthly charge, since the machines belong to the banks; not the customers.
Since the experience in Nigeria is the opposite, the coalition between the banks and the CBN is now the best platform for renewed exploitations. With pro-banking and anti-masses policies and pursuits, would it not be a great idea to suggest new charges with which the CBN and the banks can impoverishe the palliative-denied people? In my view, monthly staff maintenance charge, weekly fund security charge and bi-annual USSD/Mobile app software upgrading charge would do. Don’t you think the likes of Herbert Wigwe, Jim Ovia and company would become richer than Jeff Bezos, Bill Gate, Mark Zuckerberg put together in ten folds within few months with these suggested charges? Are your thoughts on this issue similar to mine?


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