Due to the recent pulling out of Stanbic IBTC Bank operations from the Port Harcourt International Airport, Omagwa, pressures have continued to mount on the United Bank for Africa, UBA, for bank transactions at the airport.
It was observed that airport patrons in need of quick cash or other bank transactions now depend sorely on the UBA for such transactions being the only bank in operation at the airport.
Huge crowd was sighted at the ATM stand of UBA on Monday following the exit of the Stanbic IBTC few weeks ago, as customers were seen in a long queue to make withdrawal or do transfer.
A travel agent, who narrated his ordeal at the UBA ATM stand, said he could not make cash withdrawal on Monday because the ATM machine suddenly stopped dispensing cash.
“My client wanted to travel, he transferred money to my account, but I had hoped to make withdrawal at the airport, but as I was waiting for my turn, suddenly the ATM machine stopped paying, there was no cash.
“You know the cash policy of bank withdrawal below N100,000. So, I couldn’t enter inside the bank to withdraw. They just asked me to wait for a while, and close to one hour, the machine was not paying. The whole thing ended delaying my customer, and I had to shift the trip to another airline.
“If there is another bank available at the airport, I could have gone there to use their ATM, but unfortunately, UBA is the only bank in operation at the airport”, he said.
An anonymous source from the bank disclosed that the airport branch of the bank is just a pay and cash point with limited financial transactions.
“Every other bigger financial transactions were usually referred to the Isiokpo branch,” he revealed.
It would be recalled that three other banks, Skye Bank, Polaris, and Stanbic IBTC that were formerly operating at the Port Harcourt airport pulled out recently due to what they described as high cost of land lease, leaving only the UBA in operation at the airport.
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