NHF refunds when Nigerian staff retire or die
When FMBN refunds National Housing Fund contributions to a retiring employee or a deceased worker's next of kin, and the records an employer should keep.
By Achekam · · 4 min read · For Running a business businesses in Nigeria
For most of a working life, the National Housing Fund line on a Nigerian payslip is a small deduction nobody thinks about. It becomes important at the end. When a long-serving employee retires, or when a family is dealing with a death in service, the contributions taken over the years can come back to them, and the employer's records are often what decide how smoothly that happens.
This article sets out when FMBN says contributions are refunded, what a claim has to include, and what an employer can do now so that a retiring staff member or a grieving family is not left hunting for paper that should have been kept all along.
Who FMBN says can be refunded
FMBN's page on the NHF legal framework has a section headed "Conditions For Refund". It says FMBN refunds NHF contributions:
- to a contributor who has attained 60 years of age or has put in 35 years in service;
- to retired contributors who are incapable of continuing contributions;
- to the next-of-kin of a deceased contributor.
The same section lists retirement ages of 70, 65 and 62 years for certain professions. If any of your staff work in a profession with its own retirement age, have them check the page to see which applies.
FMBN also lists refunds with 2% interest on retirement among the benefits of contributing to the Fund. Treat that rate as the page states it at the time of writing, and let FMBN confirm the figure for any individual claim.
What a refund claim needs
FMBN says an NHF refund claim needs:
- an application letter;
- the letter of offer of appointment;
- a birth certificate or declaration of age;
- completed NHF Contribution withdrawal forms;
- bank account details;
- the contributor's Biometric Verification Number (BVN).
Depending on the situation, the claim also needs a medical report where the contributor is incapable of continuing contributions, a letter of administration and a death certificate where those apply, and, for self-employed contributors, receipts as evidence of contribution.
FMBN publishes the conditions and the document list on its NHF scheme legal framework page, together with the registration procedure and the benefits of contributing. Send staff there for the current version rather than relying on a list copied into a handbook years ago.
The employer's part: proving what was paid in
Look at that list again. The letter of offer of appointment is your document, issued when the person joined. The contribution history, though not named on the list, rests on something only the employer did: FMBN says an employer must deduct NHF contributions at source and remit them with a schedule of payment showing the amounts and the period covered.
Those schedules are the backbone of a refund. They show which months were remitted, how much, and for whom. A business that kept every schedule and payment record can answer an FMBN query in minutes. One that cannot find them, or that changed payroll systems and left the history behind, turns a retirement into an investigation.
In Achekam, the Nigerian monthly schedules, NHF among them, are prepared from approved pay runs, so each month's NHF schedule traces back to a run someone approved. Payslips are PDFs with the business's logo and details, downloadable for any person, which gives a second line of evidence: the NHF deduction shown month by month on the employee's own pay record.
When an employee dies in service
A death in service is the hardest version of this process, and the family usually knows nothing about the Fund. A few things help:
- Tell the next of kin the refund exists. Many families never claim because nobody mentions it.
- Give them the employer's documents early: a copy of the letter of offer of appointment, the employee's NHF participation number if you hold it, and a summary of the months contributed.
- Explain what FMBN will ask them for that only they can obtain, such as the death certificate and a letter of administration where one applies.
- Name one person in the business who will answer FMBN's questions about contributions, so the family is not passed between departments.
None of this needs special software. It needs records that were kept properly while the person was alive.
Keeping NHF records for every employee
Document Centre in Achekam is a folder-based store where a business uploads files or whole folders, previews, downloads, renames, moves, tags, archives and searches them, and a new version of a file keeps the earlier ones. A simple structure works well for NHF:
- one folder per employee, holding the letter of offer of appointment, their NHF registration form and participation number;
- one folder per year for NHF schedules and FMBN payment receipts;
- a tag such as "NHF" on every related file, so a search finds them all at once.
Archive leavers' folders rather than deleting them. A refund claim may come years after someone leaves, and the records you keep today are what make it possible.
A pre-retirement check
Run this a few months before an employee's planned retirement:
- Confirm their NHF participation number and that it appears on your remittance schedules.
- Gather the NHF schedules and payment records for their years of service.
- Download their payslips if they want them as backing.
- Copy their letter of offer of appointment.
- Give them FMBN's document list and point out which items are theirs to supply.
For how the contribution is set up in payroll, see National Housing Fund deductions for Nigerian staff. If participation numbers were never issued for some of your staff, registering with FMBN for the National Housing Fund explains Forms NHF1 and NHF2. The kindest thing an employer can do for a retiring employee is to hand over a complete file without being asked.
General guidance only, not advice on your own circumstances. Tax and payroll rules change: check the current position with the authority or your adviser.
