In July 2016 a total of 5 million PoS (Point of Sale) transactions were made in Nigeria, while the value of these transactions increased by NGN4-billion - up from NGN55-billion in June to NGN59-billion in July.

This is according to a report released by the Nigeria Inter-Bank Settlement System (NIBSS) which also revealed that transactions were made from about 62,000 active terminals out of 121,785 PoS terminals that have been deployed.

Industry stakeholders believe Nigeria is yet to reach its peak in terms of PoS transactions.

Regha Onajite, CEO of Electronic Payment Providers Association of Nigeria (EPPAN), said many locals still do not use PoS terminals for payment and echoed the sentiment expressed by the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) to create more awareness.

"The message must continuously be in the face of the people. Now sensitisation and mobilisation should be supported by deliberate policies from the government. In my opinion, the Central Bank should implement the cash limitation policies across the entire nation. This should be supported by a reward and punishment system. The fact that it succeeded in six states of the federation shows that it will succeed everywhere in Nigeria."

Tunde Ogungbade, Managing Director of payment firm Global Accelerex said local merchants have numerous PoS assets and the industry needs proper management and monitoring metrics and analytics for these assets. "An exclusive contract for merchant acquiring does not mean your merchant cannot have other banking relationships. Contract terms may be short but this will help a merchant acquiring business properly evaluate the opportunity of the merchants' business based on transaction forecast of volume and value over a reasonable period," he said.