Wednesday June 4, 2025|

Banks on Tuesday, June 3, begun the deduction of unstructured supplementary service data (USSD) charges directly from customers’ airtime instead of their bank accounts.

The Nigerian Communica­tions Commission (NCC) di­rected banks to start deducting charges for USSD transactions directly from users’ mobile air­time.

First City Monument Bank (FCMB) announced this change in an e-mail message to custom­ers following a directive from the NCC.

Each USSD session will cost N6.98 per 120 seconds, charged by your mobile network.

One will be asked to approve the charge before it is deducted from your airtime.

If one prefers, one can use other banking channels like ATMs, mobile apps, or internet banking.

Also according to an email from the United Bank for Afri­ca to customers on Tuesday, the charges will no longer be deduct­ed from customers’ accounts.

The UBA said the directive takes effect from Tuesday, June 3.

The statement reads, “In line with the directive of the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC), please be informed that effective June 3, 2025, charges for USSD banking services will no longer be de­ducted from your bank account.

“Going forward, these charges will be deducted direct­ly from your mobile airtime balance in accordance with the NCC’s End-User Billing model.

“Under this new billing structure, each USSD session will attract a charge of N6.98 per 120 seconds, which will be billed by your mobile network operator.

“You will receive a consent prompt at the start of each ses­sion, and airtime will only be de­ducted upon your confirmation and availability of the bank to fulfil this service.

“If you do not wish to contin­ue using USSD banking under this new model, you may choose to discontinue use of the USSD channel.”

UBA said customers can con­tinue using other digital bank­ing options and internet bank­ing platform for convenience.

This change is part of a move to end the long-standing debt dispute between banks and telecoms companies over unpaid USSD fees.

As of late 2024, banks were indebted to telecom companies to the tune of N160 billion. For example, MTN was owed N42 billion by Nigerian banks.

By shifting USSD fees to cus­tomers’ airtime, the telcos aim to recover these debts and avoid future issues.

In December 2024, the Cen­tral Bank of Nigeria (CBN) and the NCC directed mobile net­work operators and DMBs to resolve the long-standing N250 billion USSD debt.

Following threats by telcos to withdraw services over the debt accumulated by banks, the NCC, in January, threatened to suspend the USSD service and publish a list of banks still ow­ing telcos.

On January 15, the regula­tor directed telcos to disconnect the USSD codes assigned to nine banks by January 27 due to un­paid debts.

On February 28, MTN Nige­ria said it received N32 billion — out of N72 billion — from banks as part of payment for the USSD debt.