Wednesday, June 4, 2025 - Telecommunications operators in Nigeria — including MTN, Airtel, Globacom, and 9Mobile, have threatened to withdraw network support for banks’ Unstructured Supplementary Service Data (USSD) services, citing what they described as deliberate misinformation to customers regarding transaction fee deductions.
USSD, commonly used for mobile banking, enables transactions
through short codes dialed on mobile phones.
On June 3, several banks issued a public notice claiming
that the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) had directed them to stop
deducting USSD charges directly from customers’ bank accounts. According to the
notice, charges would now be deducted from users’ mobile airtime balances.
The banks’ notice stated:
“In line
with the directive of the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC), please be
informed that effective June 3, 2025, charges for USSD banking services will no
longer be deducted from your bank account. Going forward, these charges will be
deducted directly from your mobile airtime balance in accordance with the NCC’s
End-User Billing (EUB) model. Under this new structure, each USSD session will
attract a charge of ₦6.98 per 120 seconds, which will be billed by your mobile
network operator.You will receive a consent prompt at the start of each
session, and airtime will only be deducted upon your confirmation and the
bank’s availability to process the service.
If you do
not wish to continue using USSD banking under this new model, you may choose to
stop using the USSD channel.”
In a swift response, the telecom operators, under the
Association of Licensed Telecom Operators of Nigeria (ALTON), condemned the
banks’ message as misleading and self-serving. They accused the banks of
twisting facts to favor their own interests and warned of a potential
withdrawal of telecom support for USSD services if the issue was not resolved.
Chairman of ALTON, Engr. Gbenga Adebayo,said in statement
“I don’t
understand why the banks are distorting agreements to suit themselves. The
information they released wasn’t a directive from the NCC, but the outcome of a
joint regulatory agreement involving the NCC, the Central Bank of Nigeria
(CBN), the telcos, and the banks.The agreement was that if the banks cleared
their outstanding USSD debts to telcos by June 2, 2025, they could then migrate
to the end-user billing model — provided the process was transparent and
mutually agreed upon.”“At this point, while a few banks have settled their
debts, most have not. So, even if all modalities for migration are in place,
implementation cannot begin until these debts are cleared,” he added.
ALTON warned that if the banks continued to violate the
agreement and mislead the public, the telecom industry may suspend USSD support
for banking services altogether.
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