Bsc:
I left 5,000 in my dormant Diamond Bank account. Please who is owing who?

steppin:
@Op,
That's for a current account not savings.
If you leave a current account dormant, there are bound to be charges in some banks.

Tokotaya:
If you have a dormant bank account in Nigeria, you could be on CBN’s debtors’ list. Let me recast that, if you have a dormant account in Ecobank, you may already be a debtor, without knowing it. Your name may have been listed as having bad credit on the Credit Risk Management Bureau (CRMB)’s database with CBN. It’s not a demarketing attempt. It is purely my experience that others can learn from.

I had a current account in Ecobank around 2011. My ex-employer moved our salaries there based on a nice presentation made by the Branch Manager of the Bank at the time. However, the promises made were not met, so the salary account was moved elsewhere and we all thought it ended there.

More than three years later, I had left the company and was processing a loan with another bank. Near the completion of the deal, they called to tell me I was owing Ecobank. I was advised to sort it out with them before any progress could be made. I didn’t take any loan. The account didn’t have an overdraft facility. It was a basic current account from which you could never withdraw above your available balance at any point in time. How could I owe on the account?

I called their customer care and the lady insisted I must have taken a loan. I insisted I did not, and tried to convince her to look into the account to see what could have happened. She rudely cut the call!

I made a series of other calls and was linked to their Oke Afa, Isolo Branch where the account resided and was able to establish that it was my dormant account there that ran into negative. Ecobank made some routine charges on the account and when they depleted what was there, they made negative deduction of N119 and the negative started accumulating interest that had amounted to about N2,500 by late last year when I applied for a loan.

What manner of a bank would make deductions from a dormant account? I went to the bank and confronted them. An official explained that an account going dormant does not mean that charges could not be made on it. He said a man can be sleeping, but his bodily functions work nonetheless.

I paid off the money and obtained a letter of Non-indebtedness and took it to my new bank before they could process my loan. The great worry: what if I had not applied for a loan at another bank? How would I have known? Many decades later, may be as a pensioner, one may now apply for something and they will tell you there’s a debt of a couple of millions of naira you need to clear.

I’ve commenced the process of closing the account with Ecobank. Other dormant accounts I have are going too, even though some of the other banks are arguing that their own processes are different from Ecobank’s. They argue that typically, your dormant account holds the last balance there till you reactivate it. One said if at all any customer’s account goes into red, his bank had a standard procedure to call up the customer by phone to alert him. No one called me from Ecobank.

How much was N119 that Ecobank would go ahead to list me as having a non-performing loan instead of calling me to clear it. The totality of my experience with Ecobank has been horrible to say the least. To even collect the Letter of Non-Indebtedness was a war. It took nearly 3 weeks of constant harassment to get it ready and on the day I was to pick it up, I spent three and a half hours in their banking hall.
So folks, check up on all your current dormant accounts, especially those with Ecobank.

Tokotaya:
If you have a dormant bank account in Nigeria, you could be on CBN’s debtors’ list. Let me recast that, if you have a dormant account in Ecobank, you may already be a debtor, without knowing it. Your name may have been listed as having bad credit on the Credit Risk Management Bureau (CRMB)’s database with CBN. It’s not a demarketing attempt. It is purely my experience that others can learn from.

I had a current account in Ecobank around 2011. My ex-employer moved our salaries there based on a nice presentation made by the Branch Manager of the Bank at the time. However, the promises made were not met, so the salary account was moved elsewhere and we all thought it ended there.

More than three years later, I had left the company and was processing a loan with another bank. Near the completion of the deal, they called to tell me I was owing Ecobank. I was advised to sort it out with them before any progress could be made. I didn’t take any loan. The account didn’t have an overdraft facility. It was a basic current account from which you could never withdraw above your available balance at any point in time. How could I owe on the account?

I called their customer care and the lady insisted I must have taken a loan. I insisted I did not, and tried to convince her to look into the account to see what could have happened. She rudely cut the call!

I made a series of other calls and was linked to their Oke Afa, Isolo Branch where the account resided and was able to establish that it was my dormant account there that ran into negative. Ecobank made some routine charges on the account and when they depleted what was there, they made negative deduction of N119 and the negative started accumulating interest that had amounted to about N2,500 by late last year when I applied for a loan.

What manner of a bank would make deductions from a dormant account? I went to the bank and confronted them. An official explained that an account going dormant does not mean that charges could not be made on it. He said a man can be sleeping, but his bodily functions work nonetheless.

I paid off the money and obtained a letter of Non-indebtedness and took it to my new bank before they could process my loan. The great worry: what if I had not applied for a loan at another bank? How would I have known? Many decades later, may be as a pensioner, one may now apply for something and they will tell you there’s a debt of a couple of millions of naira you need to clear.

I’ve commenced the process of closing the account with Ecobank. Other dormant accounts I have are going too, even though some of the other banks are arguing that their own processes are different from Ecobank’s. They argue that typically, your dormant account holds the last balance there till you reactivate it. One said if at all any customer’s account goes into red, his bank had a standard procedure to call up the customer by phone to alert him. No one called me from Ecobank.

How much was N119 that Ecobank would go ahead to list me as having a non-performing loan instead of calling me to clear it. The totality of my experience with Ecobank has been horrible to say the least. To even collect the Letter of Non-Indebtedness was a war. It took nearly 3 weeks of constant harassment to get it ready and on the day I was to pick it up, I spent three and a half hours in their banking hall.
So folks, check up on all your current dormant accounts, especially those with Ecobank.

Truflame:
The best bank in Nigeria is GTbank. Make thorough inquiries before transacting with other banks. They can really frustrate the living daylight in you

AMI3:
Exploitation of d highest order.

Empress2014:
trouble or no trouble,my Uba account will soon be dormant and maybe dormant for life,if anybody call me say I owe them money, I go swear for their forefathers ni

Tokotaya:
If you have a dormant bank account in Nigeria, you could be on CBN’s debtors’ list. Let me recast that, if you have a dormant account in Ecobank, you may already be a debtor, without knowing it. Your name may have been listed as having bad credit on the Credit Risk Management Bureau (CRMB)’s database with CBN. It’s not a demarketing attempt. It is purely my experience that others can learn from.

I had a current account in Ecobank around 2011. My ex-employer moved our salaries there based on a nice presentation made by the Branch Manager of the Bank at the time. However, the promises made were not met, so the salary account was moved elsewhere and we all thought it ended there.

More than three years later, I had left the company and was processing a loan with another bank. Near the completion of the deal, they called to tell me I was owing Ecobank. I was advised to sort it out with them before any progress could be made. I didn’t take any loan. The account didn’t have an overdraft facility. It was a basic current account from which you could never withdraw above your available balance at any point in time. How could I owe on the account?

I called their customer care and the lady insisted I must have taken a loan. I insisted I did not, and tried to convince her to look into the account to see what could have happened. She rudely cut the call!

I made a series of other calls and was linked to their Oke Afa, Isolo Branch where the account resided and was able to establish that it was my dormant account there that ran into negative. Ecobank made some routine charges on the account and when they depleted what was there, they made negative deduction of N119 and the negative started accumulating interest that had amounted to about N2,500 by late last year when I applied for a loan.

What manner of a bank would make deductions from a dormant account? I went to the bank and confronted them. An official explained that an account going dormant does not mean that charges could not be made on it. He said a man can be sleeping, but his bodily functions work nonetheless.

I paid off the money and obtained a letter of Non-indebtedness and took it to my new bank before they could process my loan. The great worry: what if I had not applied for a loan at another bank? How would I have known? Many decades later, may be as a pensioner, one may now apply for something and they will tell you there’s a debt of a couple of millions of naira you need to clear.

I’ve commenced the process of closing the account with Ecobank. Other dormant accounts I have are going too, even though some of the other banks are arguing that their own processes are different from Ecobank’s. They argue that typically, your dormant account holds the last balance there till you reactivate it. One said if at all any customer’s account goes into red, his bank had a standard procedure to call up the customer by phone to alert him. No one called me from Ecobank.

How much was N119 that Ecobank would go ahead to list me as having a non-performing loan instead of calling me to clear it. The totality of my experience with Ecobank has been horrible to say the least. To even collect the Letter of Non-Indebtedness was a war. It took nearly 3 weeks of constant harassment to get it ready and on the day I was to pick it up, I spent three and a half hours in their banking hall.
So folks, check up on all your current dormant accounts, especially those with Ecobank.

InZA:


Let me guess why?


You're a serving corper in some distant Northern region and the only available bank closest to you is UBA....But you will soon pass out in October and forget about the account altogether.

Did I get it

Empress2014:
stop guessing,kindly go through my profile and read my posts and see what uba has done to me

Tokotaya:
If you have a dormant bank account in Nigeria, you could be on CBN’s debtors’ list. Let me recast that, if you have a dormant account in Ecobank, you may already be a debtor, without knowing it. Your name may have been listed as having bad credit on the Credit Risk Management Bureau (CRMB)’s database with CBN. It’s not a demarketing attempt. It is purely my experience that others can learn from.

I had a current account in Ecobank around 2011. My ex-employer moved our salaries there based on a nice presentation made by the Branch Manager of the Bank at the time. However, the promises made were not met, so the salary account was moved elsewhere and we all thought it ended there.

More than three years later, I had left the company and was processing a loan with another bank. Near the completion of the deal, they called to tell me I was owing Ecobank. I was advised to sort it out with them before any progress could be made. I didn’t take any loan. The account didn’t have an overdraft facility. It was a basic current account from which you could never withdraw above your available balance at any point in time. How could I owe on the account?

I called their customer care and the lady insisted I must have taken a loan. I insisted I did not, and tried to convince her to look into the account to see what could have happened. She rudely cut the call!

I made a series of other calls and was linked to their Oke Afa, Isolo Branch where the account resided and was able to establish that it was my dormant account there that ran into negative. Ecobank made some routine charges on the account and when they depleted what was there, they made negative deduction of N119 and the negative started accumulating interest that had amounted to about N2,500 by late last year when I applied for a loan.

What manner of a bank would make deductions from a dormant account? I went to the bank and confronted them. An official explained that an account going dormant does not mean that charges could not be made on it. He said a man can be sleeping, but his bodily functions work nonetheless.

I paid off the money and obtained a letter of Non-indebtedness and took it to my new bank before they could process my loan. The great worry: what if I had not applied for a loan at another bank? How would I have known? Many decades later, may be as a pensioner, one may now apply for something and they will tell you there’s a debt of a couple of millions of naira you need to clear.

I’ve commenced the process of closing the account with Ecobank. Other dormant accounts I have are going too, even though some of the other banks are arguing that their own processes are different from Ecobank’s. They argue that typically, your dormant account holds the last balance there till you reactivate it. One said if at all any customer’s account goes into red, his bank had a standard procedure to call up the customer by phone to alert him. No one called me from Ecobank.

How much was N119 that Ecobank would go ahead to list me as having a non-performing loan instead of calling me to clear it. The totality of my experience with Ecobank has been horrible to say the least. To even collect the Letter of Non-Indebtedness was a war. It took nearly 3 weeks of constant harassment to get it ready and on the day I was to pick it up, I spent three and a half hours in their banking hall.
So folks, check up on all your current dormant accounts, especially those with Ecobank.

TunjiMsp:
even on savings remember you do pay for SMS alert

Faita:
There is a sense in which I can sympathize with the banks. Maintaining records must cost something. When you make someone responsible to protect your wealth or to be on standby to receive your wealth for protection or for further transport on to another receiver, I think you cost them some energy.

My annoyance with this method of business is that the service providers start out nearly or completely muting the idea that serving you will cost you money. They do that to keep you around. Then when other supporting revenue streams start to fail, they begin to employ a mixture of deceit and abrasive logic to take your money from you. At worst, they act like this Ecobank case where they don't even alert you that they are charging you anything until it's become a major problem for you. And suing them then becomes a very messy business.

A relative has an account with Ecobank and each time I've had to deal with them in his behalf I have found them less than appealing. I really wonder how their customers endure them. My experience though is that all these banks have serious customer service problems. They are very poor at taking care of their customers' interests. It makes me think that banking isn't their real business.

Could someone do an in-depth exposé on the banking industry, for heaven's sake?

I think people should seriously consider keeping personal updated records of their bank accounts and ensure to deactivate them as soon as they find them unnecessary. Chances are they will cost you something eventually to keep holding on to them.

Btw, thanks, OP, for sharing the information. It saves us all a lot of undue stress.

ehisdan:
Ecobank is a scrab bank that need to be eradicated asap. Oceanic bank was bad, i thought merging them with Ecobank will be better rather it became worse. I left the bank almost a year now with some money in d account. But now my account balance is -#853, they dnt send me alert. What then is d deduction for?. I love #fidelity bank#

steppin:
@Op,
That's for a current account not savings.
If you leave a current account dormant, there are bound to be charges in some banks.

Truflame:
The best bank in Nigeria is GTbank. Make thorough inquiries before transacting with other banks. They can really frustrate the living daylight in you

SweetSoup:
bro i left a saving of 1500naira with this same ecobank dormant for 5years after they kept charging for promotional messages wey no consine me. The account as at today has a debit bal of -206 naira, i went to complain and was advice to reactivate it, pay the debit bal and close it if i choose.

Gboliwe:
No wonder even after filling a form in firstbank to close my account, they have refused to do so. This is so I can remain indebted to them. Chai! I should make out time to go make some noise there since that's the only language they understand.

SweetSoup:
bro i left a saving of 1500naira with this same ecobank dormant for 5years after they kept charging for promotional messages wey no consine me. The account as at today has a debit bal of -206 naira, i went to complain and was advice to reactivate it, pay the debit bal and close it if i choose.

doofanc:


Funny I was told by a banker friend that you can even close an account, that dormacy is a form of closure.

doofanc:


I wnet back to check my the records of my ecobank account. I last used it around 2010, and it became dormat (see below). Then in 2013 they withdrew the remaining balance without warning (thunder fire them ) and declared it inactive. see attached. the funny thing is almost 3 years after thy still send me notification, but the balace has not gone below zero. I believe thats how a savings account should be.