Yemisi Izuora
First City Monument Bank (FCMB) has come out with a new product called FCMB Easy Account.
In a statement, while noting it was banking made accessible to all, it added that a significant and value-added feature of the product was that the telephone numbers of the customers, without the first digit, served as their respective account numbers.
“The account is an enhanced version of its *329# Unstructured Supplementary Service Data platform,” it stated.
The bank explained that FCMB Easy Account had been designed to make banking accessible to all Nigerians and would help to achieve the goal of financial inclusion for most Nigerians as set by the Central Bank of Nigeria.
It stated, “It is a product open to all, particularly to meet the needs of low-income earners and the unbanked segment of the society. It enables the account holders have access to convenient and secured financial services, irrespective of their locations.”
The bank stated that the self-service, stress-free and secured FCMB Easy Account, was available on all the Global System for Mobile networks in Nigeria, (Globacom, MTN, 9Mobile and Airtel), and it enabled everyone anywhere in Nigeria open an FCMB Easy account from his or her location, by dialing *329# from their mobile phones and following the instructions.
It added, “The development enables Nigerians who wish to open accounts and carry out banking transactions on their mobile phones do so from any location -rural, urban and remote, even if there are no banks physically located at the area. Internet service availability which has been a major constraint to mobile banking service access is not required for FCMB Easy Account as the account operates on the USSD platform.”
According to the bank, FCMB Easy Account customers can send and receive money to and from friends, families and business partners across all banks in Nigeria.