The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) and Western Union Money Transfer (WUMT) will launch the Outbound Money Transfer Services in Nigeria Friday (today)
The CBN Governor, Godwin Emefiele, said the move is to provide Nigerians the opportunity of transferring funds up to $2,000 to their relatives and dependents abroad (person to person transfer).
With this new arrangement, Nigerians will only pay the Naira equivalent to the Money Transfer Service Operators for foreign currency disbursements to recipients abroad.
Recently, the Apex Bank recently approved new Guidelines for International Money Transfer Services in Nigeria. It issued a new guideline for the regulation of International Money Transfer Services in the country, a move aimed at ensuring that all business rules governing their activities are strictly adhered to.
It noted that as a preamble to the series of obligations, the operator must be ready to comply with the provisions of CBN on “Anti-Money Laundering and Combating the Financing of Terrorism in Banks and Other Financial Institutions Regulations 2013.
The bank said the objectives of the guidelines were to provide minimum standards and requirements; specify delivery channels for (inbound/outbound), in a cost effective manner; provide an enabling environment; specify minimum technical and business requirements for various participants; and provide broad guidelines for implementation of processes and flows of international money transfer services, from initiation to completion.
The new rule holds that payment must be made to customers only in Nigerian currency, in line with CBN’s subsisting regulation and at the prevailing exchange rate on the day the transfer is received; while the operator likewise should declare in the receipt/certificate of transfer that the money paid to the customer is not counterfeited.
It added that all the money transfer operators shall comply with the guide to money transfer charges, as provided by the CBN from time to time. It warned that no person or institution shall provide international money transfer services unless such per has been duly licensed by the CBN.
