From my experience the KYC processes at Opay, which self-describes as safe and secure, are squalid. They’re shit. Hot shit. Don’t dupe yourself into believing that you’re safe. I operate a Palmpay account. Until this morning, I had never attempted to set up an Opay account. I did not succeed setting it up because I discovered that someone with my three names and phone number operates an Opay account. I was mystified at the discovery and think this is grossly unsafe. The person could commit fraud and I could end up paying for it, say. That this happened is a result of formidable negligence on the part of Opay. I have no doubt.
Exactly what its KYC processes are I don’t know. I do not want to speculate, but I think Opay’s KYC processes are worse than poor. The number I attempted to use to set up an account is linked to my NIN, BVN and bank accounts, of course. How it could be in use by another person in Opay’s system eludes me. But in the meantime, the backstory.
I wanted to move N50,000 to my Palmpay account from my Zenith Bank Plc account this morning. On account of a concentration outage I can’t explain, I typed Opay as the destination bank instead of Palmpay. My phone number, which serves as my account number, was correctly inputted and it threw up my name. I made the transfer, but got no notification from Palmpay. Strange. Very strange.
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I checked a few minutes later and there was still no notification. I checked the receipt on my @ZenithBank app and discovered that the destination bank I typed in error was Opay. I called a friend, who advised me to open an Opay account and that the money would drop. I asked why it left my account at all since I had no Opay account. I felt it should have been reversed. He asked that I should go set up an Opay account.
If the Opay account holder is funding terrorism or involved in other crimes, he warned, I could get into a really sticky situation. I also suspect that there may be hundreds of people in a similar situation where shabby KYC processes make them sitting ducks.
I went through the whole facial recognition shebang, got an OTP and later a request for the last six digits of my BVN before things screeched to a halt.
I typed the last six digits and I got a response that they were out of sync. How? I wondered. I called the Opay customer care desk to know what happened. Someone named Funke, who spoke in Yoruba, attended to me. I chose to be served in that language because I thought, from my experience with telco help desks, my chances of being quickly attended to were brighter.
I gave the Funke my name and the number with which I tried to open an account with. She said the number is linked to an Opay account with the name Bamidele Temitope Johnson. She advised me to speak to my bank. My bank? I asked why it was even possible in the first instance, given KYC. She said she didn’t know. I contacted my bank, which said it couldn’t do anything because the names of the Opay account holder to whom I sent money in error are the same as mine.
The person I spoke with at my bank warned that I need this resolved. Very quickly, too. If the Opay account holder is funding terrorism or involved in other crimes, he warned, I could get into a really sticky situation. I also suspect that there may be hundreds of people in a similar situation where shabby KYC processes make them sitting ducks. Trouble is just around the corner and they don’t know.
