The landscape of electronic financial services in Nigeria is set to witness a major shift as two leading companies in banking and telecom sectors of the economy, FirstBank of Nigeria Plc (FirstBank) and GLO Nigeria Limited have agreed to combine their strengths to provide seamless Mobile (money) Financial Services to millions of Nigerians. Speaking at the signing of a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) recently in Lagos, the two companies promised to combine their strengths to provide secure, convenient, affordable and user-friendly mobile financial services to all Nigerians through the use of mobile phones.
Mobile Financial Services is the use of mobile phones either as an access to bank accounts, or as a bank account in itself, for account inquiry, mobile transfer, retail payments, micro insurance, savings remittances, mobile top-up, utility bill payments and government collections among others.
Commenting on the initiative, FirstBank’s Managing Director/Chief Executive Officer, Mr. Bisi Onasanya said mobile financial services help to achieve financial inclusion for the unbanked and the underbanked, person to person transaction in terms of sending and receiving money as well as retail payment for the purchase of goods and services. He added that “With over 600 branches and thousands of business partner outlets in strategic proximity to the people, coupled with over 1,600 ATMs including cash deposit ATMs, cardless and biometric ATMs, over 5million active accounts and more than 3,000 Point of Sale terminals, FirstBank has always been at the forefront of innovative financial services solutions.
In addition to the mobile financial services, Onasanya said FirstBank has in place a world-class IT infrastructure to drive its e-payment services across transaction touch points. These services, according to him, include: Internet banking services, bespoke card product portfolio that addresses the payment needs of the entire Bank’s discerning customers, Automated Teller Machines (ATMs), Point of Sale Terminals (POS), and Cash Deposit ATMs amongst others.
The Group Managing Director further assured that FirstBank will continue to lead the innovation drive in the mobile financial services space through progressive and robust upgrades that will enable customers perform actions such as salary lodgement, pension and other types of payments and disbursements. Onasanya further affirmed that with a rich heritage, dependability and innovative dynamism, FirstBank is naturally the best partner for any telecom company to provide this novel initiative.
In his speech, Mr. Adewale Sangowawa, Executive Director, Globacom said that the network is proud to place its extensive reach and enormous power and strength behind this product, which will ensure quick, efficient and seamless transactions. ‘’Our platform, Glotxtcash, is the very first of its kind in Nigeria. It is a mobile money service channel that will ensure that people need not carry a wallet and a mobile phone at the same time anymore, and our desire is to make the service available to all Nigerians through our licensed partners’’. Sangowawa said that the partnership with First Bank will ensure that any subscriber on the Glo network will be catered for under the e-banking scheme.
The mobile financial services initiative, an integral part of the broad objectives of the FSS 20:2020 was conceived by the Central Bank of Nigeria because of its critical role in achieving a “cashless society” which is fundamental to the nation’s goal of becoming one of the top 20 largest economies in the world by the year 2020.