Nigeria’s leading corporate e-payment platform, Remita was in the spotlight recently when about 120 selected senior bank executives from 22 commercial banks met in Lagos.

The event was a one-day bankers’ interactive forum organized by SystemSpecs to discuss the current trend in Nigeria’s e-payment space and how SystemSpecs’ integrated biometric, payroll and e-Payment solution, Remita can continue to deliver world-class services to customers.

John Obaro, Managing Director SystemSpecs, said “The rate of adoption and growing importance of corporate e-Payment in Nigeria’s economy has made this gathering necessary. There is need for all stakeholders to continue to work together to achieve operational efficiency on e-Payment to meet our national goals and aspirations.”

A the forum, Obaro explained the disadvantages of using one system to capture biometric data, another to calculate payroll and a third to make payments.

“Experience has shown that when one software application is used for biometrics, another for payroll, and yet a different one for e-Payment you never can be sure that the three datasets you will be dealing with, would always contain the same data. Accordingly, it is possible to capture the biometrics of your staff and pensioners on one dataset, but using a different payroll application may lead to payroll figures for names not necessarily on the Verified Biometric Dataset.”

“Furthermore, even if the biometric and payroll datasets are the same, a manual transfer to an unconnected e-Payment Platform is another possible source of errors.

It is easy for intentional and unintentional errors to be made as data is transferred between systems. The only solution is to eliminate the need for transfers. This can be achieved by adopting an integrated one-stop application in which all three applications are operating from the same dataset,” Obaro added.

The bankers shared experiences, and presentations were made by six of the participating banks; GTBank, Sterling Bank, Fidelity Bank, Union Bank, Wema Bank and First Bank.

Femi Nwaosa, GTBank e-Business and Card Services spoke on ‘Remita Customer Setup Process’.  Nwaosa informed the forum that, “GTBank was the first to issue Remita card to a customer six years ago. Customer setup process is very easy on Remita.”

Sunny Adeduro, Head, e-Payments Sterling Bank made a presentation on ‘Remita Non-Switch Model’. According to Adeduro, “Remita is the most reliable platform for making high volume transactions in Nigeria today.”

George Asomba, Fidelity Bank IS Control talked on ‘Remita Straight-Through-Process (STP)’. Asomba said, “STP has made it possible for Fidelity to process large volume customers’ transactions faster and more efficiently to the delight of our esteemed clients.”

Barthlomew Ochogu of Union Bank e-Business’ presentation was on ‘Remita Branch and Central Processing Centre (CPC) Deployment Model’. Ochogu explained how UnionGalaxy powered by Remita has empowered Union Bank branches to process their customers’ instructions electronically and effect payments to beneficiaries with ease.