The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) has announced the revision of its existing clearing system rules for Deposit Money Banks.
The Director, Banking and Payments System Department of the CBN, Mr. Dipo Fatokun, in a circular issued to banks, mobile money operators and payment service providers, said the revision of the Nigeria Bankers’ Clearing System Rules is in furtherance of its mandate for the development of electronic payments system in the country. It takes effect from September 1, 2018.
According to the revised rules, electronic payment instruments will be presented to the clearing system in the next applicable session if instruction is received from customers less than two hours before closure of session available for the financial instrument, unless the relevant service agreement dictates otherwise.
The apex bank said: “A member bank will be suspended from participating in any clearing session if an amount of clearing collateral that has been utilised to fund an account is not replaced within two business days, or if a collateral so discounted is insufficient, or if a bank overdraws its settlement account maintained with the CBN for three consecutive working days.
“A member bank can also be suspended if it persistently overdraws its account with its settlement bank and the settlement bank communicates its intention to stop settling for such a non-settlement bank to the CBN and Nigeria Inter-Bank Settlement System Plc, or if a bank fails to provide the requisite infrastructure to enable electronic exchange of eligible payment instrument, or fails to maintain adequate collateral with either the CBN (in the case of a settlement bank) or its settlement bank (in the case of a non-settlement bank) in accordance to section six of these rules.”
According to the revised rules, the return period of cheques, which used to be the same day, has been extended to 5pm of the next day.
“All clearing instruments returned unpaid shall now bear the appropriate returned reason code,” the CBN added.
“In addition, the failure of a member to indicate the correct reason for returning a payment instrument would attract a fine of N250 per instrument,” the CBN said.