Weekends, which are off days for bank employees, frequently have the greatest rates of unsuccessful financial transfers, leaving Nigerians stuck whenever this happens.
Fund transfers according to Nigeria Inter-bank Settlement Scheme (NIBSS) can be carried out via Nigeria Electronic Fund Transfer (NEFT), NIBSS instant payment (NIP), Point of sale terminals (PoS), Automated teller machine (ATM), and Unstructured supplementary service data (USSD).
Abiodun Olaibi, chief growth officer of Airopay, said the lack of commitment from the service providers and lack of infrastructure on the fintech’s end can cause great displeasure in the recurring phase of delayed or failed fund transactions, especially during weekends.
“Massive transactions during the weekends hit various platforms, and their volume and processors can’t handle the magnitude of such transactions.”
According to him, the inability to pay overtime and support tech talent has caused glitches for this service provider; however, these platforms, including banks and the NIBSS, could increase their server capacity in order to handle and accommodate more transactions.
BusinessDay observed that during the weekdays’ customers always troop into banks to lodge complaints about failed transactions that had occurred during the holiday.
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Glory Ikechi, a customer service representative at Access Bank, stated that “the banking hall is always busy as crowds besieged the halls on Mondays and Tuesdays.” Attending to angry customers over unsuccessful transfers of funds takes a toll on her, and she is sometimes forced to extend her service hours beyond the normal time.
”Technical issues frequently impede the activities of banks, and their customers are not immune.” Banks that face this issue tend to lose customers at the height of such crises. Tech talents who are brought in to provide solutions are not compensated appropriately.
A customer also told BusinessDay that when this happens during the holiday, he seems unable to attend to his own and his family’s needs, and once the week commences, he receives a message from his bank apologising for any inconvenience they may have experienced as a result of the technical glitch on our banking channels.”
According to experts, once these banks upgrade their network facilities to meet the needs of their banking customers, going cashless and embracing the digital channel will be fully accepted; however, banks must invest heavily in their network for transactions to be seamless.
