SecureID Nigeria Limited, a digital solution provider certified by Visa, MasterCard and Verve, in partnership with Sterling Bank plc, has provided a new Biometric Identification Card to drive financial inclusion in the country.
With approximately 46.3 percent of the Nigeria population currently unbanked, this new initiative is billed to deliver financial services at an affordable cost to the disadvantaged and low-income segments of the society.
Richard Oshungboye, head, financial inclusion, Sterling Bank, said the biometric card, which is designed to hold the bio data, fingerprints and account information of the card holder, will be used by customers with access to formal financial services such as deposit, cash withdrawal, paying of bills, recharge card, fund transfer, etc.
“SecureID provides solutions that aid performance and efficiency in service delivery. I attest to the fact that, the successful implementation of our Financial Inclusion Project as confirmed by the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) which is the biometric enabled and first of its kind in the country. It has been made possible by SecureID being the only company that could produce the much needed Biometric
Cards,” Oshungboye said in an interview with BusinessDay.
Responding, Ola Salami, innovation and product development expert at SecureID, noted that SecureID was delighted to partner Sterling Bank to bring this initiative to the unbanked population, in support
of CBN’s vision to reduce unbanked rate from 46.3 per cent to 20 percent by 2020.
To conduct a transaction with the biometric card, the customer inserts the card into the PoS terminal and places his or her finger on the fingerprint sensor on the PoS terminal. The terminal then validates
fingerprint supplied by the customer against the one stored on the card. If the supplied fingerprints match the one stored on the card, customer will be able to perform any of the transactions referred to
above.
The deployed PoS terminal also serves as an enrolment tool for the purpose of Know Your Customer requirements as it has a key pad and webcam to fulfill requirements for account opening.
Sterling Bank, a national commercial bank in Nigeria, has an asset base above $4.4 billion, and a network of 168 branches across the country.
Alexander Chiejina
