AMMAN picks holes in shared network initiative of banks
ASSOCIATION of Mobile Money Agents in Nigeria (AMMAN) has pick holes in the Central bank of Nigeria (CBN) and money deposit banks’ recently launched Shared Agent Network initiative, saying that infrastructure on ground does not support massive rollout of agent network in the country.
Shared Agent Network initiative entails an aggressive rollout of a 500,000 agent network within two years to offer basic financial servic- es. The approved Cbn-bankers committees’ roll out ratio will be as follows North-east 30 percent, North-west 30 percent, north-central 20 percent; south-south 7.5 percent, south-east 7.5 percent, and south-west 5 percent.
Victor Olojo, national president, Association of Mobile Money Agents of Nigeria (AMMAN), told Nigeria Communicationsweek that recruiting 500,000 agents across the country within the next two years is not difficult and what is tall order to achieve is managing that number with poor infrastructure they are presently facing in the business of agency business.
“Presently, banks and licensed mobile money operators lack capacity to manager issues arising from network downtime. Web based solutions does not have the capacity to carry out transactions volume of up to 5,000 let alone when 500,000 are brought into the system.
“There must be concrete plans to improve upon available infra- structure to be able to support additional agents into the system. More so, there is knowledge gap in the management of agents by banks officers who does not understand business of informal sector. Over the years, we have noticed that some bank staff lack basic knowledge on digital financial service, “he said.
Olojo urged CBN and banks to put in place Agent support system in dealing with agents who are people not regulated by any institution.