NIGERIA:Banks recorded 200,284 failed instant e-transactions on Monday

Bank customers experienced 200,284 failed electronic payment transactions on the Nigeria Interbank Settlement System Instant Pay platform on Monday.

The NIP, an online real-time product that facilitates instant payment of bills on an account, as of 7.22pm on Monday, recorded a total volume of 4.86million transactions, live updates provided by the NIBSS showed.

Analyses of the electronic payment data indicated that a failure rate of 4.12 per cent was recorded on the platform.

NIP has been adjudged the most preferred platform for electronic payment having grossed more transactions in monetary terms than NEFT and e-bills pay over the years.

The statistics also showed that Point of Sale transactions carried out by retailers in the country had a high failure rate of 14.44 per cent as of 7.22pm on the same day, out of a total transaction volume of 531,149.

Stakeholders in the industry have attributed the high rate of failed transaction on the PoS to poor network, and the payment systems using multiple SIM cards, WiFi or Local Area Network have been developed to address this.

Commenting on the factors responsible for the failed transactions, the Head, Corporate Communications, NIBSS, Lilian Phido, said that it could be traced to network issues in the banks; insufficient funds in the customers’ account or problems on the NIBSS platform.

She said, “There are many parties associated in a typical transaction. The bank, customers and NIBSS are involved. If the customer doesn’t have money in the account or the account is lean, the transaction will fail. If the bank has network issues, the transaction will fail at that moment. If the NIBSS platform is down, then the platform will not work in all the banks, not just one bank. This is very rare because it means the platform will not work in any of the banks.”

Despite the preference of Nigerians for electronic payment over over-the-counter transactions, industry report showed that fraudsters have stolen about N237bn since 2007 from Nigerian banks through the various electronic payment systems.

The Chairman, Committee of E-Banking Industry Heads, Mr. Dele Adeyinka, recently said that the rising volume of transactions across different payment channels meant stakeholders would need to constantly look for ways to ensure the e-channels were more secure for people to transact without fear of losing their money.

According to the Head, Industry Security Services, NIBSS, Mr. Olufemi Fadairo, of all the e-payment channels available in the country, the ATM, web and mobile account for 77 per cent of fraud incidents.

Fadairo tasked stakeholders on the need to consolidate data in the industry towards mitigating fraud incidents.

SOURCE:PUNCH