Nigeria’s Guaranty Trust Bank (GTBank) has introduced a new service on its network that allows its customers make third party funds transfer via USSD codes on their mobile phones.
With the USSD code *737*, a GTBank account holder can transfer funds to another GTBank account holder and other financial institutions in the country. To initiate transfers to a GTBank account, a sender will dial *737*1*Amount*NUBAN Account No (10 digit account number)# and for transfers to a recipient in another bank, the sender will dial *737*2*Amount*NUBAN Account No (10 digit account number). The transaction will then be authenticated by the sender inputting the last four digits of their GTBank Naira MasterCard. The only catch is that the number from which the transaction is initiated be registered along with the sender’s bank account.
GTBank shared this development with TechCabal in a statement from the bank’s CEO, Segun Agbaje. “This service addresses the electronic banking requirements of our customers, irrespective of their phone type,” he says.
The bank is clearly not looking for heavy traffic on the channel with a minimum transfer limit of NGN1,000 and maximum of NGN20, 000 daily.
GTBank is building on a technology it introduced late 2014 that allows its customers buy airtime on their mobile phones from their GTBank accounts by dialing USSD code; *737*AMOUNT#, a service which extended few months after to allow bank customers recharge other numbers aside numbers registered with the bank on account opening.
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