Banks expand dollar account to boost remittances

IN an effort to boost international payments and foreign exchange inflow in the country, Nigerian Banks have commenced the opening dollar accounts for remittance recipients who had none.

The move is a response to CBN’s order to banks to facilitate money transfers through the automatic opening of dollar accounts for those who presently do not have any.

The purpose of order is to ensure that all international money transfers would be successfully processed even if Naira account details were entered for the transactions.

However, this applied to a $2,000 withdrawal limit, according to the Central Bank of Nigeria.

The apex bank said this was to ensure that transactions did not fail due to a recipient not having a dollar bank account.

Transparency will also be introduced by the CBN by guaranteeing that all recipients received an exchange rate that reflected the market rate.

“We are very pleased by the CBN’s decision to mandate Nigerian banks to help citizens who do not have a USD account by automatically providing this facility on their behalf,” the Country Manager, Nigeria and Ghana, at WorldRemit, Gbenga Okejimi, said.

“This development will make all the difference to those who receive support from family and friends abroad.

“For our part, we are excited by the fact that we can continue to enable the transfer of remittances to more people across Nigeria whilst also supporting the Nigerian government in its efforts to strengthen the economy.

“When our founder came up with the idea to create WorldRemit, it was with the ultimate goal of ensuring that the diaspora community could send money back home easily and through a safe platform.”

It can be recalled that WorldRemit had recently announced the expansion of its US dollar payout option with nine of its existing bank partners.