Over 20 million customers have been enrolled by the various banks in the ongoing Bank Verification Number, BVN, exercise, the Nigeria Inter Bank Settlement System, NIBSS, Plc, disclosed recently. This milestone is coming even as NIBSS, in its quest to ensuring the success of the exercise started collaborating with telecoms firms to create a platform through which banks’ customers can confirm their registration status.

Already, NIBSS has collaborated with one of the country’s telecoms service providers, Etisalat to roll out the BVN Query Service. The service, which was unveiled at the NIBSS headquarters recently, is designed to help the banking Nigerian public Query their BVN on-the-go via their mobile phones.

According to a statement yesterday, the initiative is coming on the heels of the extended deadline for the BVN registration, which ends on October 31 nationwide.

The BVN registration was a directive from the Central Bank of Nigeria, CBN, to all Deposit Money Banks (commercial banks) in the country to register all their customers biometrically in furtherance of the Know Your Customer, KYC, policy.

Speaking on the service, Ade Shonubi, managing director of NIBSS, said the initiative was in response to growing public demand for confirmation of BVN status by those, who have enrolled on the platform. He added that the BVN Query Service would boost such efforts like KYC for banks.

Francesco Angelone, chief marketing officer, Etisalat Nigeria, said the partnership with NIBSS on USSD BVN Notification Service was in line with the telco’s commitment to continue to create value for the consumers across all sectors including the banking and telecoms industries. “We are happy to be the first to offer this product among the operators because we believe that innovation is the way the telecoms industry must lead,” Angelone said.

He explained that Estisalat believes that going in this direction of offering value to the banking public is another way Etisalat can show the telecoms industry the way to go.  “The integration with the banking industry is a pillar for development. Etisalat subscribers can check their BVN registration status and number by dialling a dedicated  code for an instant response at a cost of N10 per Query,” he added.

The Query Service is based on instant request- instant response and aims at providing utility for those who have enrolled on the BVN platform of the CBN