Eyowo, a Nigerian digital bank, has assured their customers that their funds would be retrieved as the company is close to resolving the issues they have with the Central Bank of Nigeria.
This assurance was given by the bank’s CEO and co-founder, Yomi Adedeji via a Twitter space organised by the company over two months after their licence was revoked in May 2023.
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How the challenge has affected Eyowo’s customers
One of the customers of Eyowo, has cried out over funds for her rent saved with the company, stating that she would be homeless in approximately two weeks if the company does not release her money. Eyowo’s digital banking licence was recently suspended by the CBN.
During a Twitter space that was organised by Eyowo to update its consumers on the steps it is making to reclaim its operating licence from the CBN, a woman who identified herself as Chikamso claimed that she had been saving the money for her rent on the app and that the rent is now due but that she is unable to withdraw the money.
“I just really need to know when this is going to be fixed and when I can access my money because I’m about to be homeless. I put my savings for my rent in there and I need this fixed in a week or two. If not, I don’t know where I’m going to be sleeping,” she said
The cancellation of the company’s licence and the limitation of access to clients’ assets have put a damper on the plans of another Eyowo user named Edwin. Edwin wanted to save money so that he could fund a business concept he had for starting his own company. Edwin also bemoaned the fact that despite the fact that the corporation had continued to reassure its clients over the course of the past two months, there was still no sign of a solution.
“I’m quite disappointed at how it has been handled to this point. Yes, we’re all waiting for the resolution of the licence issue, but there are things that people need money for. I’ve been saving for like three years now. All my savings since I started working has been in Eyowo and at this point, I do not have any savings again. I’m only living on my salary I cannot do things I want to do.”
“I’m trying to create a startup to solve problems and I say look, let me save this amount of money. I want to pay people now to build my business, but I can’t. I just needed the money to invest in my business now so that I could move ahead. Everybody wants to move ahead in their life or in their career. Every meeting we have had, you always say ‘we are getting there, we are getting there’ yet we are yet to get our money,” he said.
The assurance Eyowo’s CEO gives
Yomi Adedeji, the Co-founder and CEO of Eyowo, apologised to the company’s clients for the inconvenience this situation has caused, and he stated that the company is now very close to resolving its concerns with the CBN. In order to avoid getting the customers’ expectations up, he stated that he would prefer not to give a particular date for when they will be able to resume routine activities on their accounts.
“Essentially what I’m trying to say is that we are at the tail end of what we need to do to get ourselves back up. However, our regulators and those who are like our regulators, we do not have any complete control over their bureaucratic process, we have no control over the approval process internally. And we can only just wait and follow it through,” he said.