CBN reportedly probes banks over restrictions on forex account withdrawals

The Central Bank of Nigeria is reportedly investigating complaints that some commercial banks are restricting customers from withdrawing foreign currency held in their domiciliary accounts.

The development follows complaints from account holders who say they have experienced difficulties accessing US dollars, British pounds and other foreign currencies despite having sufficient balances and meeting the requirements for operating their accounts.
According to Financial Vanguard, the apex bank is aware of the complaints and is considering measures that would require banks to honour legitimate foreign-currency withdrawal requests without unnecessary restrictions or delays. Vanguard News
Checks at several banks reportedly found different practices.

Some customers said banks placed limits on how much foreign currency they could withdraw at once, while others were told that dollar notes were unavailable.
At one bank, a customer seeking to withdraw $5,000 was reportedly told that only $3,000 could be provided.
At another branch, customers were allegedly limited to $1,000 because of what bank staff described as a shortage of physical dollar notes. Linda Ikeji’s Blog
There were also complaints that some banks offered customers mainly lower-denomination notes, including $20 bills.
A source described as close to the CBN said the regulator had received several complaints involving obstacles to legitimate domiciliary-account withdrawals and was examining the issue.

The source said the CBN could issue a circular directing commercial banks to review their procedures and ensure customers can access foreign currency deposits when they have complied with applicable account requirements.
Some banking sources also alleged that foreign currency deposited by customers could be used for other trading activities instead of being made immediately available for cash withdrawals.

That allegation has not been independently established. Linda Ikeji’s Blog
As of the reporting reviewed for this article, the proposed directive had not yet been presented as a publicly issued CBN circular.