Reps to probe banks over excessive deductions from customers’ accounts

The House of Representatives has mandated its Committee on Banking and Currency to investigate the excessive charges on bank transactions by Deposit Money Banks (DMBs) in Nigeria and report back within four weeks for further legislative action.

This followed the adoption of a motion by a lawmaker representing Esan North-East/Esan South-East Constituency, Edo State, Hon Sergius Ose Ogun, during a plenary on Wednesday.

Ogun, in his motion, said most of the DMBs in Nigeria impose excessive and non-statutory charges on varying bank transactions carried out by customers.

He said in a bid to, among other things, stop the indiscriminate imposition of charges by DMB, the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) had in January 2020, issued a guide to charges by banks, other financial institutions and non-bank financial institutions, stating the approved bank charges to be imposed.

Ogun however expressed concerns that despite the guide issued by the CBN, some banks still deduct “outrageous” amounts of money from their customers in the guise of bank charges with different descriptions.

He said in most cases, the deductions were already covered by the CBN approved monthly Account Maintenance Fee (AMF), thus amounting to double deduction.

Contributing, another lawmaker, Sada Soli, described the motion as apt, saying, Nigerians are indiscriminately charged by banks for deposits, withdrawals, card maintenance, account maintenance and other hidden charges.

Speaker Femi Gbajabiamila while adopting the motion described it as “very important.”