"When Two Elephants Fight": MTN, Airtel, Others May Begin Charging Customers For Bank Transfers

• Telecommunication companies may begin to charge bank customers directly as they seek to resolve pending USSD debt
• The disclosure was contained in a proposal which the CBN allegedly sent to stakeholders
• The development means telcos may start billing bank customers directly to cover the cost of USSD transactions

MTN, Airtel, Glo, and 9Mobile may begin to charge bank customers' airtime or data for USSD transactions.

Reports say the proposal from the stakeholders' forum led by the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) was to resolve the billing and debt crisis between the telecom companies and commercial banks.

The two sectors have been in a running battle over N120 billion USSD debts that the banks have refused to pay, which CBN says bothers on technicalities.

CBN wades into the face-off between banks and relcos

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Punch reports that Isa Abdulmumin, CBN's Acting Director of Corporate Communication, disclosed earlier that the bank was meditating in the face-off.

Abdulmumin stated that the apex bank is aware of the lingering dispute between the banks and telecom firms and has been engaging all the parties to arrive at an agreeable solution.

The CBN spokesman said the direct intervention of the bank in March 2021 resulted in a reduction in billion to N6.98 per session between the banks and the telecom companies.

He said:

"USSD fees are charged by DMBs using an automated system which bills the customer for a successful transaction only after a banking service is consumed."

"For the Telcos, a successful transaction happens once the customer has dialed the USSD short code, which may not lead to the consummation of banking service."

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"While such truncated transactions are not registered on the DMBs collection platform and thus not billed to bank customers, telcos expect the DMBs to charge customers once the shortcode is dialed, whether or not a financial transaction is consummated."

Abdulmumin stated that the CBN had proposed a direct billing model to enable the telecom operators to have complete visibility of USSD transactions and also let them charge their customers directly, stating that concerned stakeholders were still modifying the model.

Direct billing involves charging customers directly via their airtime or data.

CBN Wades Into N120 billion USSD debt dispute between telcos And banks as NCC gives nod to disconnection

Legit.ng reported that the Central Bank of Nigeria has waded into the protracted dispute between telecommunication companies and Nigerian banks over the N120 billion debt the banks owe to telcos.

The telcos say that the banks are indebted to them to N120 billion for service provided through Unstructured Supplementary Service (USSD).

The heated dispute led to the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) giving the telecom companies the go-ahead to disconnect the banks.

Source: Legit.ng