Review policy on PoS now, ePayment firms tell CBN

Operators in the electronic payment sub-sector have tasked the Central Bank of Nigeria to review its policy on the use of Point-of-Sale terminals as a means of payment in the country, saying the associated weakness contributes to the slow pace of growth of the sub-sector.
According to a report released by the industry’s Payment Terminal Service Aggregator, the number of deployed terminals dropped from 141,531 as at August 2017, to 140, 448 in September 2017.
The President, Association of Mobile Money Agents in Nigeria, Mr. Sarafadeen Fasasi, attributed the situation to the lack of support to drive the innovation.
“The CBN should provide the required financial backing for transactions on the PoS just the way ATMs are loaded with cash for withdrawals. Today, there are no facilities for PoS agency business by the banks, which is the major determinant of success or failure of PoS innovation,” he said.
Fasasi decried the lack of structures on ground to resolve issues arising from PoS transactions.
He said, “If a customer’s account is debited without ATM paying, the individual will go to the bank and fill a form for reversal, but in PoS transactions, there is no such thing, which has pushed customers to resolve to holding on to PoS attendant to ensure that the issue is sorted out.
“As at today, all issues arising from ATM, switching, PoS, and online among others, are under NIBSS, which does not have the capacity to cope with these issues,” he said.
According to him, the policy is due for a review to build trust, confidence in the use of the platform for payment.
“PoS fixed charge is high at .075, this means that the customer is charged N750 on N100,000 transaction, compared to N65 charged on withdrawal outside of the customer’s bank ATM,” he added.
The Chief Executive Officer, E-Payment Providers Association of Nigeria, explained that his organisation had taken steps ahead to break the barrier of the poor
adoption.
He said, “We are looking into capturing the lower part of the pyramid with the mobile payments awareness, which will see more people included financially and thereby increase the adoption of the cashless policy.
“We are also open to discussions on advocacy and sensitisation from financial bodies, who have products and services to render in the pursuit of the success of this policy. From time to time, we carry out sensitisation, financial literacy and education programmes and we partner with stakeholders to expose the benefits of electronic payments to consumers across the strata.”