Bank of Ghana in its press release dated 28th September 2022, has stated that mobile money loan defaulters who have intentionally refused to register their SIM cards under the ongoing national SIM card registration will have their credit reports affected and may risk their chances of obtaining a loan facility from other financial institutions.
This comes after The National Communication Authority’s directive to the general public to have their SIM cards registered with their Ghana Card.
This has put a lot of pressure on the telecommunication service providers and their customers since the exercise is somewhat hectic. Most people could not genuinely go through this registration process due to technical issues and of course petty administrative lapses whereas some chose to ignore the whole process in order to avoid servicing their loans.
This called for public outcry and the NCA saw the need to extend its deadline which of course was not want of punitive measures. As we all know, the most recent is its ongoing exercise to block all outgoing calls and data services of unregistered SIM cards on a rotational basis this month.
It follows that some unscrupulous people have taken loans from these telcos via their mobile money platforms and have deliberately refused to have their SIM cards registered in order to avoid the repayment obligation they owe to their lenders.
The central Bank of Ghana, acting as a regulatory body for all financial institutions in Ghana has announced that data of all mobile money loan customers are domiciled with credit bureaus which means that a loan acquired through any mobile money platform is treated as a loan facility from any financial institution such as a bank.
Consequently, this leaves a footprint on an individual’s credit report when it is pulled from any credit bureau’s database. So, merely discarding your SIM card after obtaining a loan will not totally preclude you from the repayment obligation you owe to your lender which can adversely affect your creditworthiness in case you wish to obtain another loan facility in the future.
The Bank of Ghana has encouraged borrowers in this bracket to reach out to their lenders or respective telecommunication service providers to initiate negotiations on repayment options available to them to make do their accounts.
This will go a long way in determining a person’s creditworthiness for future loan facilitates as it will cancel any information regarding late payments or default.