Nobody Should Pay N50 Charges On POS Transactions, Says CBN – TheNigerialawyer

The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) has clarified the issue of
payments of N50 charges by merchants who use Point of Sale (POS)
machines for cashless transactions, insisting that nobody should
pay extra on goods and services.

The CBN explained that the N50 stamp duty is a fee regulated by
an act that directs merchants to pay all necessary taxes as
regulated by government agencies.

Speaking on Channels Television’s Business Morning programme,
the CBN Director of Payment System Management, Musa Jimoh, said the
apex bank issued a circular and merchants have misinterpreted the
directive.

“Stamp duty has been misinterpreted, our circular that talks
about merchants paying stamp duties according to the law do not say
that the stamp duty should be paid by the consumer; that is a
misrepresentation of CBN directive. What our directive says is that
merchants should pay all necessary tax as regulated by government
agencies including stamp duty.

“What we told the merchants is that we would like the banks to
ensure that the merchants comply with this directive by ensuring
that every single payment that customers make to them, the
merchants pay the regulated stamp duty of N50.

“What has happened is that they have actually transferred this
fee blatantly and openly to the consumers; this is very wrong. No
single individual should pay N50 in addition to the cost of the
goods.

He stated that “Stamp duty is not to be paid by individuals that
are consuming the goods and services of the merchants, the
merchants who are receiving the money are the ones who are supposed
to pay.”

Mr. Jimoh explained that because the stamp duty is not regulated
by the CBN, there are no plans to stop stamp duties.

“Stamp duty is not a CBN regulated fee, it is a fee regulated by
an act, and so we can’t change or push anything in that
direction.

To this, the stamp duty remains and cannot be changed by the
CBN, what we are doing is to ensure that the institutions we
regulate (the banks) become more responsible to ensure that these
fees are collected and given to the government.