Going Cashless This Summer With FirstBank Travel Kits – TheNigerialawyer

By Obinna Emelike (BusinessDay)

Having worked round the clock since the beginning of the year,
it is ideal to take out time to relax and rejuvenate. Well, you do
not need to wait until the end of the year to unwind as summer is
already beckoning on discerning holiday makers to seek refuge in
top travel destinations across the world.

If you have not jetted out yet due to the stress of traveling,
especially the trouble of settling your travel bills, tickets and
sundries, you can now do so and seamlessly too with the FirstBank
Visa Multicurrency card, which allows you to go full cashless this
summer in anywhere in the world.

The Visa Multi Currency Card, introduced by First Bank of
Nigeria Limited, Nigeria’s premier and leading financial services
provider, is an all-in one-card and first of its kind to be offered
by any financial institution in the country. Most importantly, it
can be linked to all of the four major currencies namely: NAIRA,
USD, EURO and GBP accounts.

Beyond the international passport, the card is handy for the
Nigerian business traveller and holiday makers, especially this
summer period, which comes with lots of expenditures on airfares,
hotel accommodations, tour bookings, shopping, theatre/concert
tickets among others.

The card holders enjoy many benefits including; Point of Sale
and online purchases, access to and use of ATMs worldwide, as well,
there is no cash collateral requirement prior to its issuance. As
expected, FirstBank is delighted in the innovative card, which
offers seamless transactions to users, especially holiday makers
frolicking in top destinations across the world this summer.

Chuma Ezirim, Group Executive, e-Business & Retail Product,
First Bank, sees the card as a milestone in the bank’s innovation,
saying that, “FirstBank takes pride in pioneering the Visa Multi
Currency Card in the country, as we remain committed to providing
products and services that are designed to ensure the banking
convenience of our customers regardless of their location.” For
Ezirim, the card is designed to make traveling fun for the Bank’s
customers and to ensure they have a seamless transaction experience
during their vacation, tourism and other business-related trips
around the globe. Having tested the card himself, he enjoined the
Bank’s customers traveling abroad for summer to walk into any
FirstBank branch for their Visa Multi Currency Card.

While abroad, the bank’s customers can enjoy improved daily
withdrawal limits of $1,000 on ATM, $2,500 on POS and $6,250 on
web-based transactions. At home, they can withdraw as much as N150
on ATM, N500,000 and N2, 500,000 (from savings and current accounts
respectively) on POS – N500,000, and N1,000,000 on web transactions
locally.

Also, customers who use the Bank’s Naira Master Card (NMC) have
no need for BTA/PTA and stand to enjoy seamless transactions this
summer with $5000 monthly spending limit and $300 daily ATM cash
withdrawal limit.

The seamless experience continues with the Visa Gold Card, which
offer higher daily spending limit on ATM ($1,000), POS ($10,000)
and WEB ($5,000) anywhere in the world.

To ensure seamless transaction while on holiday this summer, the
Bank urged customers to change their PIN before travelling out of
the country to avoid transaction failures/invalid card.

However, the Bank assures its customers of safety with
additional protection for web based transactions with “Verified by
Visa” (VbV) and Chip & PIN technology with a lifespan of 3
years. With safety, the Bank is consolidating on its huge strength,
which it assures the customers should rely on to further do
business with it, including transactions outside the country as it
watches their back with card security features.

Presently, FirstBank is the first financial institution in
Nigeria to issue a whopping 10 million cards to customers across
the country, and now among two other African banks to achieve the
milestone. The 10 million cards issuance follows other feats such
as the first financial institution in the country to achieve
sustained alternative channels transaction volumes of 100 million
transactions in December 2015 and May 2016.

The most excited in all the achievements is Adesola Adeduntan,
Chief Executive Officer, First Bank of Nigeria Limited. For him,
delivering the Visa Multi-Currency Card feat at this time is a
testament to the bank’s drive in delivering to its brand promise of
putting customers first and continuously improving its business to
serve them better. “One of the ways by which we were able to
sustain this winning edge is the use of our instant
issuance/instant activation technology, which we pioneered about 10
years ago. We have also consistently maintained the highest active
card ratio in the industry.

“This feat also implies that our customers are becoming more
technology savvy and we would continue to encourage this attitude
with our commitment to world class service delivery. Therefore, we
must work to ensure optimal performance and availability of all our
channels such as ATM, FirstMobile among others to guard against
customer dissatisfaction”, explained the FirstBank CEO.

However, the feats are being recognised from outside the bank
and even by the industry regulators. FirstBank recently bagged a
hattrick of awards at the Interswitch Connect Sales Dinner &
Awards Night in Lagos recently. The awards are: Most improved
Mobile Application, Highest Transacting Bank (across inter-switch’s
solution) and Highest Number of Verve Transacting Cards (Unique
Cards).

Speaking on the awards, Folasade Femi Lawal, the bank’s Head,
Card Business, said the awards are indeed a reflection of the trust
by Nigerians on the bank’s digital channels as it leaves no stone
unturned at reinventing itself, products and services with a view
to remain steadfast at being a frontrunner at promoting
digitization of the industry.

With 125 years of experience in the banking industry, servicing
over 15 million customer accounts, over 750 business locations and
banking technologies that are well aligned to the fast paced
technological advancement in modern day banking, FirstBank assures
customers the best of service, security and experience even this
summer.

Once again, the Bank urges customers traveling abroad for summer
to walk into any FirstBank branch for their Visa Multi Currency
Card for a seamless holiday experience anywhere in the world.

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