Apostle Ejike S. Emereonye
ejyvic@yahoo.com
Towards the end of the month of June 2013, banks sent out information to their customers to the effect that, as from the last day of the month of June 2013, no customer would be allowed to withdraw more than a certain stipulated amount of money over the counter as directed by the apex bank, the Central Bank of Nigeria, CBN.
Whatever may be the case, the customer is not allowed unfettered access any more to his money as before. He must now issue cheques to his own customers or clients.
Perhaps the Central Banks argument of not allowing too much cash in circulation as they claimed, they even called it liquidity. I am not an economist and definitely not a financial expert, is it that it will bring down inflation, improve our economy and our personal security as you can no longer at any point in time be dispossessed of huge amount of money by armed robbers etc.
Not being a financial expert, I immediately began to wonder within me which one would have been better for Nigerian; liquidity or dryness? I beg your pardon, if cashless and less cash means one and the same thing, then all well and good. But of cashless means without cash, it will be some how. For if a keke ridder conveys and drops you and you pull out your cheque book, wahala will burst.
This much talked about cashless policy has been in operation in many countries ranging from the semi to the very civilized countries but now being made so much noise over in Nigeria as if it is something new. Only third world countries like Nigeria celebrate antiquities as innovations and then go ahead to ruin it.
Was it not because of it that the ATM Automatic Teller Machines were introduced into the banking system and customers were given cards of various nomenclatures with which to access their funds? There is the Master Card, the Verve Card, the Visa Card and so on, just name it.
The most important word in the ATM card operation is that it is automatic. But has it always or even ever been? There was the initial rude extortion of N100.00 (one hundred naira) only for service charge. This was later charged by the payee bank if you were not that banks official customer. We bore that for so long until the CBN became more responsive and stopped it.
Its stoppage implied that you can use for instance a UBA card and rush to Access Bank and access cash without much delay.
But one observes that after times it never works, as some banks and their machines mischievously or is it erroneously refuse to honour other banks ATM cards. At times they even do not honour their own and network will be blamed and if not network then power will be blamed.
Was our technology sufficiently prepared for the cashless policy before its imposition on the citizenry if I may ask?
Why is it that what works in other countries or places do not always work here or are we the ones that fail the systems?
Judging from the teeming population of Nigeria and the delays people encounter while waiting on the ATMs, has anybody bordered to calculate the ATM/population ratio.
What does it cost to install an ATM which in civilized countries are installed in petrol filling stations, Super markets, Restaurants and other public places.
Most thought provoking is that even the ones installed right there under the very nose of the banks, have never satisfactorily worked. There will always be long queues and at times in multiples showing that people are being delayed in their attempts to make transactions. Is it that the Nigerian brands of ATMs are easily overwhelmed?
We have often heard stories of our business men imposters suggesting to their manufacturers that standards and qualities of products be reduced so as to weaken their durability.
Hence they do not last long in the hand of the buyer. The idea is that so long as products fail, consumers who are at the mercy of sellers will continue to buy.
Are the ATMs in Nigeria in this category? Were they exhaustively used overseas before being refurbished and pushed to the Nigerian dumping ground market since we are inferior in technology?
Some time ago there were hues and cries over peoples’ times being wasted in the banks. I remember now with serious fun, how Chief Zebrudaya Okoroigbo Nwaogbo alias 430 reduced the phenomenon to a joke when people were advised to carry sleeping mats to banks suggesting that the delays may get longer and that one might need to spend the night and sleep over in the bank.
The banks woke from their slumber and withdrew the seats which they hitherto provided for customers to sit, suggesting that the bank want her customers to transact their businesses and leave.
Recently, the seats are back in the banking halls. Could this be the real meaning of backward integration? Pardon me; I have earlier confessed that I am not an economist. The most disappointing today is that some banks are beginning to provide seats at the ATM cites instead of increasing efficiency. Does this not point towards the failure of no more delays policy or practice of the banks.
For goodness sake, how can and why should a bank that is worth its salt and name install up to (4) four ATM machines and only one is functional or operational or is it a deliberate cashless policy whereby customers leave the bank out of frustration over inability to make withdrawals.
They even claim that you can make payments using the ATMs to third party customers.
How can one trust a machine that cannot solve your immediate problem of cash need while you are standing there are have the confidence that in your absence, it will do magic?
I know of someone who believed and made payments to DSTV on an ATM machine. After 2 clear weeks of disconnection, she had to go to DSTV office and paid cash and became reconnected. Till date the DSTV has not acknowledged the payment and the payment have not been reversed by the bank.
On the other hand, one needs to hear stories of people’s experiences with banks and their ATMs. You rush to the bank with an urgent need for cash. You slot your card into the ATM and the machine promptly debits you without dispensing any one kobo and despite your need and the urgency or emergency, you are told to wait for 24 hours? Unfortunately after 72hrs that is clear 3 days nothing happens then you go to the bank and after a drill, the debit is reversed manually for the automated machine. You can imagine waiting this long for someone who had an emergency and needed immediate cash to transact a business and is further made cashless by the bank and or policy that says you should not carry your money with you.
The most worrisome and painful is in the foreign exchange transaction where the banks do not issue anyone with foreign exchange unless you present your flight ticket and all that. Now you are not traveling to anywhere but simply want to pay the school fees of your ward schooling abroad where there is neither ASUU nor ASUP with incessant strikes and school calendar disruptions.
The banks will not sell dollars to you and policy says you cannot withdraw your money to meet your need. All the same you must have to go to a bureau de change or AMA HAUSA for your throat to be cut because they operate an autonomous foreign exchange market. Unfortunately, meager $3000 (three thousand dollars) is by far more than the limit you are allowed to withdraw in Naira local currency under our cashless policy.
The question is; did our policy makers and money managers do all the needed calculations and reasoning regarding difficulties that could be encountered before they jumped into the conclusion of a cashless policy or do we want to practice it just to belong to the categories of countries where it is in practice regardless of network and NEPA failures?
At times wisdom should dictate that economic policies be fashioned, relative to situations and environments and most importantly level of technological advancement and not just text book knowledge.
In the last 5 years a friend of mine has had to buy the dollar from the “open market alias “Ama Hausa”, then pay into his domiciliary account in a bank and then order the bank to effect a transfer to the relevant place just to pay his daughters school fees.
What if the student visited home and is given the Ama Hausa purchased dollar to take along. Now consider a situation where one fell into a wrong hand and buys counterfeits and is discovered in America. Does America know Ama Hausa? Someone had been compelled to risk jail even ignorantly. Even at that how much Naira can buy $5000 dollars (five thousand dollars). This would mean that you have to go to the bank several times for several withdrawals.
It had been hoped that after many banks failed and reforms were instituted, with many more still being fashioned, including the recent cashless policy, our banking system and transactions should have by now improved so as to increase the confidence in the policy managers.
The only thing that has been achieved is that our level of endurance has become more elastic, our frustration increasing and our disappointment imminent.
There is the urgent need to totally review the banks operational styles and the entire monetary policies.
If a customer must spend nearly one hour and at times more for ordinary ATM withdrawal, he should be allowed into the banking hall to withdraw with the voucher at whose level we really are. Let us stop pretending if care is not taken the defeat of the cashless policy is here with us.
Pray, let it not come with a people’s revolution that, over money and money matters will be worse than can be imagined.
The Nigerian citizen is already inundated with security, political, power and other social problems.
Monetary policy should not be allowed to become one other addition. No one should create new problems, if old ones are difficult to solve assuming that sincere efforts are being made to solve them bearing in mind that sincerity is always subject to proof.
