The volume of POS transactions in Nigeria increased significantly by 89 million in the first quarter of 2019. This is higher than the earlier record increase of 83.8 million from Q4 2018.
This is according to the Q1 2019 financial report from financial transaction regulatory body; Nigeria Interbank Settlement System (NIBSS).
The report also revealed a drop in the value of POS transactions to N633.8 billion in Q1 2019 from N714.344 billion in Q4 2018. In February 2019, the value and volume of POS transactions dropped drastically as against the previous quarter. Whilst the volume of POS transactions dropped from 28.2 million to 25.8 million in February 2019, the value of transactions dropped to N193.426 billion from N222 billion in January 2019.
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According to the live data report on the NIBSS website in March 2019, the rate of failed transactions between February and March 2019 was at an all-time high. 96,000 out of 340,653 transactions performed on March 29, 2019, failed. However, the failure was attributed to a internal system crash from NIBSS according to news reports in the the Guardian NG. The NIBSS settlement system reportedly crashed in December 2018.
Following that, an upgrade was announced to curb the failure rates in March 2019. NIBSS also revealed that they are expecting an increase in card transactions afterwards. However, the POS statistics for April 2019 has revealed a significant growth which showcased the success of the upgrade. The value of transactions in April were N246.097 billion as against the price from December 2018. The volume of transactions also grew to 33.4 million in April, which is the highest ever recorded by the POS industry.
Adoption of POS and Card Transaction continues to witness an upward trend across Nigeria as statistics show, this poses an advantage for the country’s drive towards a cashless economy driven by financial technology.
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