Nigerian banks involved in the Unstructured Supplementary Service Data (USSD) services debt saga have made partial payments to telecommunications operators in the country.
Gbenga Adebayo, chairman of the Association of Licensed Telecommunications Operators of Nigeria (ALTON), confirmed the development on Monday.
Speaking at forum in Lagos, Adebayo revealed that, “The matter has been de-escalated. Money has been paid, and we are making progress thanks to the regulators.”
Recall that on January 15, 2025, the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) issued a public notice that customers of nine deposit money banks (DMBs) may not be able to use the USSD services to complete transactions through their banks because of debts worth N160 billion.
The telcos accused the banks of not remitting the USSD access fee (N6.98 telco fee) charged by financial institutions when customers use the service to purchase airtime or make fund transfers via their mobile devices.
The telecom sector’s regulator named the affected lenders as United Bank for Africa (UBA), Sterling Bank, Polaris Bank, Zenith Bank, Jaiz Bank, FCMB, Fidelity Bank, Wema Bank, and Unity Bank.
The latest development means the USSD services of these financial institutions were not disconnected by the telcos by January 27, 2025, as earlier threatened.
About N250 billion was initially owed the telecom operators, but this has been brought down to N160 billion, and according to the payment timeline earlier released by the NCC, the next instalment should be by July 2, 2025, and the final payment by December 31, 2025.
