Suspend the growth in ATM withdrawal fees, CBN representatives say

The Chamber of Representatives has asked the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) to immediately suspend the new policy that will prescribe an ATM withdrawal taxes and an interruption of free ATM withdrawals for customers using other automatic banks.

The lower chamber claims that the policy imposes on the additional financial tasks to the Nigerians, requesting the CBN to wait for adequate commitments with the relevant committees on banking, finance and financial institutions to make measures and decisions.

This is the continuation of a motion of urgent importance sponsored by Marcus Onbun during the plenary on Tuesday.

CBN, in its new circulation, analyzed the ATM transaction fees stipulated in accordance with section 10.7 of the “CBN guide for taxes, other financial and non-bank financial institutions” until N100 on N20,000 withdrawals applied to customers from other banks trading from ATMS within the banking premises.

The main debate on motion, Onbun, mentioned that the mentioned section 10 was last reviewed in 2019, reducing ATM transaction taxes from N65 to N35 per transaction.

The parliamentarian has decided that “Nigeria citizens are already facing more economic weights, including high inflation, increasing fuel prices, increasing electricity rates and numerous banking taxes and services that significantly reduce the available income and have a negative impact on the economic well -being of citizens.”

He expressed his concern that the imposition of additional tax withdrawal would limit the financial inclusion of Nigerians, discouraging the winners with low income from accessing banking services, thus contradicting the CBN financial inclusion agenda.

The room later adopted the motion after the majority parliamentarians voted in favor of it.