CBN sets up centres in North America, Asia, others to facilitate BVN registration

The Central Bank of Nigeria, CBN has named twelve approved centres across Europe, North America, Asia, Middle East and Africa to facilitate the Bank Verification Number, BVN registration exercise for Nigerian banks’ customers in the Diaspora. The approved centres include the ones in Washington DC, Atlanta, New York and Houston, United States of America; Johannesburg, South Africa; Beijing, Guangzhou and Shanghai, China; New Delhi, India; London and Leicester, United Kingdom; and Dubai, United Arab Emirates.

The customer may approach OIS for the BVN, where the communication from NIBSS is not received within 48 hours after the enrolment. Thereafter, Nigerian banks’ customers in Diaspora are expected to forward their BVN to their banks for linkage with their accounts.”CBN also disclosed that, “Online Integrated Solutions OIS has been engaged to establish stations for data capture and generation of BVN at a fee of GBP30 per transaction, payable by the customer. The company is expected to capture necessary data for online transmission to the Nigeria Interbank Settlement System, NIBSS who would therefore generate the BVN and communicate same to the customer.

Besides Leicester and London where enrolment had already started, enrolment at all the approved centres is expected to kick off from August 24, 2015 for Washington DC, and August 19 for Dubai, UAE while September 7, 2015 has been slated for the possible go-live date for the registration in Johannesburg, Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou and New Delhi.

September 14 has been slated for possible go-live date for the exercise in Atlanta, United States of America while possible go-live dates for New York and Houston Centres have yet to be determined. The circular added that information on other enrolment centres not listed above will be communicated soon and that customers should visit the NIBSS website for updates on the go-live dates.

The apex bank also directed customers intending to register through OIS to make a booking first and confirm an appointment through the organisation’s website before they could be attended to. In the circular entitled: “Circular on the framework for the enrolment of Nigerian Banks’ customers in Diaspora for bank verification exercise issuance’ CBN presented two options for the Diaspora customers to participate in the BVN registration exercise.

It said: “Nigerian banks’ customers in the Diaspora could present themselves for enrolment for the BVN without travelling to Nigeria. The first option is for the customers of Nigerian banks to present themselves to the offshore branches/subsidiaries of any Nigerian money deposit bank, where such facilities have been made available, for the enrolment for the BVN. The deployment of scanners and other devices to these locations have started in earnest.