Due to the N5000 withdrawal restriction set by commercial banks, point-of-sale (POS) operators have chosen to purchase cash from market vendors and gas station employees in an effort to have enough funds to operate their businesses.
According to Daily Trust, POS operators pay N1,000 to N2,000 to purchase N100,000–N200,000 in cash from market vendors or gas stations, which results in a 100% rise in consumer fees.
For example, POS operators now charge N200 instead of N100 for N5000 they used to charge.
Automated Teller Machines (ATM) and the lack of cash from banks over the counter have hampered business activity, according to POS operators who voiced their worries in an interview with Daily Trust.
Beauty Odion, a POS operator, emphasised the difficulties faced by POS operators, emphasizing that many of them wasted their working hours looking for money, causing them immense suffering.
“Now, because of the scarcity of cash, you leave home very early in the morning looking for cash. By 11 am till 12 pm, you are still on the way. Sometimes, I go to about four to five banks and check their ATMs too, sometimes you might be lucky to see cash.”
Due to the lack of cash and the N50 Electronic Money Transfer Levy (EMTL) that Fintech companies are required to pay, she bemoaned the low client patronage that has resulted from POS operators raising their fees from N100 to N200.
“Yes, we have increased our charges but customers refuse to pay. Yeah, coupled with our bank removing money from us, they are now collecting N50. So, we increase our charges. We find it difficult to get the cash and yet the customer will refuse to pay the right price for us. So, you can see it’s really affecting us. We cannot make much gain again,” she said.
Okechukwu Christopher described his struggle to obtain money, emphasizing that he had come up with a different strategy by relying on his neighbor, who sells basic groceries at the market.
Olumide Sheriff went on to say that he gets his money from market vendors since he can’t get enough money out of banks to run his business every day.
“For two weeks, it has been difficult to get cash. The highest that banks give us is N5000, so we have to go to market people to collect cash or from filling stations. The market sellers prefer giving out the cash rather than holding it, most when they want to purchase new items,” he said.
CBN issues new rules for PoS operators
Legit.ng reported that the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) mandates that all Point of Sale (PoS) operators process their transactions through two approved Payment Terminal Service Aggregators (PTSAs).
Nigeria Interbank Settlement System Plc (NIBSS) and Unified Payment Services Limited are the approved PTSAs.
In a circular posted on its website on Thursday, September 13, the CBN said the decision is part of its efforts to enhance the administration and oversight of electronic transactions in the country.
