Paying suppliers by NIP transfer safely
How NIBSS's NIP transfers work for Nigerian supplier payments, why Name Enquiry matters before you send, and a routine for checking bank details.
By Achekam · · 4 min read · For Running a business businesses in Nigeria
A supplier sends an e-mail: "Our bank details have changed, please use the account below for this invoice." The message looks right, the logo is right, and the invoice is genuine. Your accounts clerk opens the banking app, types in the new account number and pays. Two weeks later the real supplier calls asking where their money is.
Nigerian transfers move fast, which is exactly why a mistake or a fraud is so hard to undo. This article explains how NIBSS's NIP service works, the check it builds in before money is sent, and the routine a business can wrap around every supplier payment so that the speed works for you rather than against you.
What NIP is
NIBSS describes NIP as its service enabling real-time transfers across Nigeria. It is a person-to-person, person-to-business and business-to-business funds transfer service, and NIBSS says it is designed to give the beneficiary value straight away.
NIP is based on account numbers. Customers reach it through mobile and internet banking, POS and ATM, USSD, the web, and agent and third-party channels, and all CBN-licensed institutions have access to it. If your clerk pays suppliers at other banks from the business's banking app, ask your bank whether those transfers go over NIP.
Name Enquiry: the check before the money moves
NIBSS says NIP's Name Enquiry service lets the source institution validate the beneficiary's details based on the account number. In everyday terms, this is the moment your banking app shows the account name after you type the account number.
That name is the single most useful fraud check in the whole process, and it is the one most often skipped. A clerk who is busy reads the first word, sees something plausible and taps "send". Make it a rule that the name returned by the bank must match the supplier's registered name as it appears on your supplier record and on their invoice. A personal name on a company's invoice, a slightly different company name, or a name that has nothing to do with the supplier is a reason to stop.
Name Enquiry tells you whose account it is. It does not tell you that the supplier asked you to pay into it. Both questions need an answer.
Status queries and limits
NIBSS lists NIP's other services as Funds Transfer (Direct Credit), Funds Transfer (Direct Debit), Transaction Status Query and Balance Enquiry. The Transaction Status Query lets an institution query the status of a transaction sent earlier.
This matters when a transfer seems to hang. The worst response to an unclear status is to send the payment again. Ask your bank to confirm the status of the first transfer before anything else goes out, or the supplier may end up paid twice.
On limits, NIBSS says the NIP transaction limit follows CBN regulatory guidelines: the maximum value per transaction per financial institution is kept on the platform, and each participant must also comply with regulation on transaction limits. The NIBSS page does not state the amount, so ask your bank what applies to your account, especially if you pay large supplier invoices.
Settlement behind the scenes
NIBSS says NIP is a Deferred Net Settlement system in which funds are available in the beneficiary's account in real time, before settlement between institutions, with currently 12 settlement sessions for institutions.
For your business, the practical meaning is simple: once the beneficiary's bank has credited the account, the money is there for whoever controls it. The settlement between banks happens later and does not give you a window to change your mind.
What Achekam does and does not do here
Achekam does not send the money. Paying a supplier in Achekam only records the payment, and no bank payment file is produced for suppliers. The transfer itself happens in your bank's app or portal, over NIP or another channel, and the record in Achekam follows it.
What Achekam does give you is a single place for supplier details. A business keeps one supplier list with duplicate checks by name or VAT number, and quotations, orders and bills pick their supplier from it. A second "supplier" with the same name, created by someone in a hurry, gets caught.
There is also a pattern worth copying from payroll. In Achekam, an employee's bank account entered or changed by one person must be verified by another person before it is paid in the payment schedule or bank file. No equivalent control is described for supplier bank details, so put the same rule in place by hand: one person records a changed supplier account, a different person verifies it before the first payment.
A safe-payment routine
- Start from the approved bill, not from the e-mail. Check the supplier on the bill is the one on your supplier list.
- Treat any change of bank details as suspect until confirmed by a phone call to a number you already hold, never one given in the e-mail that announced the change.
- Have a second person verify the new details and note who checked and when.
- Run Name Enquiry and compare the returned account name with the supplier's registered name.
- Send the transfer and save the bank's confirmation.
- If the status is unclear, query it through your bank before resending.
- Record the payment in Achekam against the bill with the bank's reference, and keep the confirmation with it.
NIBSS sets out how NIP works, including Name Enquiry, status queries, limits and settlement, on its NIP product page. Checking the supplier's Tax ID belongs in the same routine; see checking a supplier's Tax ID before you pay. And because the payment record in Achekam follows your bank, bank statements without live feeds explains how to bring the statement in afterwards. The account name on the screen is the last chance to stop a wrong payment; give whoever pays permission to stop.
General guidance only, not advice on your own circumstances. Tax and payroll rules change: check the current position with the authority or your adviser.
