Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) on Sunday, denied videos and pictures of the purported circulation of N2, 000 and N5,000 banknotes in the country.

The apex bank in a tweet via the official Twitter handle are warned false and fake.

CBN called on Nigerians to disregard claims of such banknotes and urged members of the public to report anyone found in possession of such to law enforcement agencies.

Recall that in 2013, the CBN under the leadership of Sanusi Lamido Sanusi had said it was going to introduce a N5,000 banknote into the country.

Recently, the social media was abuzz after aman reportedly visited a bank and deposited the sum of N17m with yet to be designed or released N5000 and N2000 naira notes.

In accompany video, a lady could be heard in the clip, revealing how the man stormed the bank with the bundle of new 5000 and 2000 naira notes to deposit it.

Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) has revised timelines for reversals and/or the resolution of refund complaints on electronic channels, with effect from June 8, 2020.

Mr. Godwin Emefiele, CBN governor

This is to further enhance service quality, particularly quick refunds when customers experience failed transactions, ATM dispense errors or disputes.

Isaac Okorafor, director, Corporate Communications of the apex bank said on Sunday that failed ‘On-Us’ ATM transactions (when customers use their cards on their bank’s ATMs) shall be instantly reversed from the current timeline of three days.

“Where instant reversal fails due to any technical issue or system glitch, the timeline for manual reversal shall not exceed 24 hours.

“Refunds for failed ‘Not-on-Us’ ATM transactions (where customers use their cards on other banks’ ATMs) shall not exceed 48 hours from the current three to five days.

“Resolution of disputed/failed PoS or Web transactions shall be concluded within 72 hours from the current five days.”

He added that all banks had been directed to resolve the backlog of all ATM, POS and Web customer refunds within two weeks starting June 8, 2020.

Meanwhile, key service providers in the Nigerian payments system have also committed to establish an integrated dispute resolution platform for the industry and enhance their payment system infrastructure and processes to reduce incidences of transaction failure.

Okorafor requested bank customers to refer to the updated Guidelines for the Operation of Electronic Payment Channels on the Bank’s website (www.cbn.gov.ng) for further details.

First Bank of Nigeria Limited, has said it has reinforced its technology infrastructure to enable anyone in the country open a FirstBank account through their mobile phones, without visiting any of its branches nationwide.

This is as part of efforts to enhance financial inclusion in the country.

The lender explained that the investment in its mobile banking infrastructure is in furtherance of the need to deepen financial inclusion in the country.

According to the bank, enabling account opening to be carried out on *894# USSD banking, FirstMobile (self-service telephone banking), its website – www.firstbanknigeria.com – as well as the Bank’s staff, through the Direct Sales Executive (DSE) application installed on their mobile phone.

“ATMs and the bank’s over 55,000 FirstMonie Agents spread across the country. Opening an account with FirstBank through any of these means is seamless, convenient, fast, and user-friendly.

Explaining how the DSE App works, the bank said, “It is an end to end encrypted mobile application installed on the phone(s) of FirstBank staff which enables them to open an account for to-be customers. Upon the completion of the account opening process via the DSE App, the customer is notified of his or her account number through a text message on the mobile phone used to register the account.”

Commenting, Chuma Ezirim, group executive, e-Business & Retail Products, First Bank of Nigeria Limited, said, “beyond opening an account in any of our over 700 branches, we are delighted with the investments at reinventing our business processes over the years, especially with the use of technology. This has been critical to staying relevant in the industry for over 126 years and being the financial partner of the first choice to all our customers and Nigerians, irrespective of where they are.

“Creating these virtual ways of opening a bank account with us – thus; the staff DSE App, ATMs, FirstMonie Agents, *894# USSD banking, FirstMobile and our website – reinforces our resolve to ensure that more Nigerians and residents have access to banking, especially through our state of the art financial services and we remain resolute to being the key to banking, enabling business and financial activities that would continue to propel the country’s economic growth and development”, he added.

With FirstBank’s *894# USSD banking, various banking activities are carried out on a mobile phone – across the four major GSM network operators in the country – without the use of the internet. To open an account via this means, dial *894# then select ‘open an account’ to provide the information required or by simply dialling *894*0#. The Bank currently has over 9.5 million of its nearly 20 million customers on its USSD banking platform.

The FirstMonie Agent Banking is an agent banking initiative from the bank that is designed to take banking closer to people, thereby bridging the gap between the banked and unbanked.

FirstMonie is a channel through which various banking activities like FirstBank account opening, funds transfer, bill payments, data and call credit recharge services, amongst others are carried out.

The Agent Banking initiative has also contributed to reducing poverty, being responsible for the indirect employment of over 150,000 people across the country.