Commercial banks’ technology upgrades over the past few weeks has caused untold hardships to customers, striking fear into those operating accounts in rural communities.
The situation is now set to worsen as more banks have announced that they will be upgrading their IT infrastructure over the next few weeks.
Sterling Bank customers were the first to taste the pill of frustration after the bank’s migration of its systems from T24 to SEABaaS, a new custom-built core banking locally-developed application, caused disruptions that lasted for days.
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Zenith Bank disclosed on October 1 that it was undertaking routine maintenance of its IT infrastructure to improve the quality of services. Although the bank did not specify the exact nature of the maintenance, media reports revealed it involved migrating its core banking platform from Phoenix, software developed by London-based Finastra, to Oracle’s Flexcube.
This shut out many Nigerians from banking operations and left several customers stranded and frustrated after it extended for over a week. Beyond personal inconveniences, Zenith’s IT upgrade delayed salary payments for many companies. @CuteNaija wrote, “All my workers I paid with Zenith Bank have not received salaries 48/72 hours after” an X user said.
An employee from an affected company confirmed he and his colleagues had been informed that their salary delay was due to the bank’s IT upgrade.
“We have had issues processing payment from our salary bankers due to the nationwide network downtime & extended routine maintenance embarked on by the bank,” an email from the company management read.
These prolonged disruptions have escalated tensions, with some customers protesting outside Zenith Bank branches due to the long delays in accessing their funds.
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While Nigerians are still healing from long weeks of banking disruptions, Access Bank and Guaranty Trust Bank have also announced planned updates of IT infrastructures.
From Friday (October 11), GTB will begin a “transition to a new and robust suite of Finacle Core Banking Application Systems.”
On Sunday, customers will be shut out from digital channels for 11 hours. “Please note that there will be no service on our digital channels for 11 hours, specifically from 10.00 pm on Sunday, October 13th till 9.00 am on Monday, October 14th, 2024, as part of the transition process,” the bank said.
According to reports, the bank is moving its core banking platform change to Finacle, a software built by Infosys from Basis.
Access Bank, on its part, announced on Tuesday (October 8) that it will upgrade its systems from Saturday (October 12th) to Sunday (October 13th). “During this period, there will be a temporary service disruption on our Access More app, Internet Banking platform, and ATMs. However, your card will work seamlessly and *901# will be available for funds transfer, airtime and data purchase as well as bill payment,” it said.
Although the bank has postponed this exercise until later, many more commercial banks are expected to follow suit. These upgrades are in response to the surge in digital payments and the increasing need for improved cybersecurity.
According to the Nigeria Interbank Settlement System (NIBSS), cashless transactions rose by 84.37 percent to N572.63 trillion between January and July 2024. Fraud losses have also risen by 496.96 percent over the past five years, fuelled by the rise of electronic payments.
“The amount lost to fraud has increased over the past five years, along with the growth of financial transactions in the digital payments sector,” the NIBSS highlighted.
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To combat this, banks are investing in technology upgrades. Six commercial banks increased their spending on technology, including cybersecurity, by 176.09 percent to N196.89 billion percent in the first half (H1) of 2024 compared to the same period in 2023.
While the importance of IT infrastructure in today’s banking industry cannot be overstated, prolonged disruptions lead to escalated tensions and unnecessary headaches for many holders of the over 200 million active bank accounts in the country.
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