The Nigerian Interbank Settlement System Plc. (NIBSS) have stated that Nigerian banks have issued over 24 million Bank Verification Numbers (BVN) to their customers as at the end of March this year.
According to the report obtained from NIBSS, while over 30.1 million account holders had enrolled for the BVN, only 24 million had received their verification numbers.
As such, over six million bank customers, who have enrolled for the exercise, are yet to be issued BVNs, according to the data analysis. Meanwhile, the number of enrolled bank customers represents about 34.7 per cent of the total 86.5 million banks accounts opened by government, corporate and individuals with various banks in the country.
According to the Executive Director, Technology and Operations, NIBSS, Mr. Niyi Ajao, the purpose of the project is to use biometric information as a means of first identifying and verifying all individuals that have account(s) in any Nigerian bank and consequently, as a means of authenticating customer’s identity at point of transactions.
He said the BVN exercise would also provide a uniform industrially accepted unique identity for bank customers, to authenticate transactions without the use of cards using only biometric features and Personal Identity Number (PIN) identification of blacklisted customers.
According to the monthly analysis of the NIBSS latest data on banking accounts and BVN enrollments, starting from January 2015, it was noted that that 2.2 million accounts were enrolled in January; 2.7 million in February; 3.3 million March and by April, May and June, the figures had increased to 7.7 million; 9.2 million and 12.4 million respectively.
In July, August and September, the figure increased to 12.7 million; 13.7 million and 14. 5 million accounts, while in the last quarter of the year, 16.3 million accounts were enrolled in October; 21.2 million in November and in December, the figure stood at 28.2 million. Last January, the number of enrolled bank accounts for BVN further increased to 30.1 million. The January figure is the latest in the industry.
The data has also revealed that the number of bank accounts opened with different banks in the country so far has reached 86.5 million. The number of accounts opened so far in the country has increased from 75 million in January last year to reach 85 million by the end of December last year.
In January this year, the number of bank accounts residing with various banks seated at 86.5 million. Further analysis of the bank accounts data showed that total active accounts in the country dropped from 59 million last December to 58.5 million at the end of January this year.
