There are a lot of online loan platforms in Nigeria today, but most of them always require the Bank Verification Number (BVN) of customers before they can give out loans to them.
However, many people are always afraid of giving out their BVN to these online loan platforms. This is probably because they are afraid of being scammed, they don’t always know if scammers will use their BVN to steal all the money in their account, either then or in future time.
This is why many people have been searching for loan apps where they can borrow money without providing their BVN to them. But is there even any loan app without BVN in Nigeria? We are going to look into that right away.
What is BVN?
The Bank Verification Number (BVN) is an 11-digit number that is unique to any individual using a bank account in Nigeria. Before one can open a bank account in Nigeria, the person must have a BVN or must be enrolled for BVN first. The BVN stores an individual’s information, ranging from name of the person, address, date of birth, picture, finger print, etc. Once one gets a BVN, the details in the BVN remain the same across any bank or any place.
The BVN simply serves for easy identification at Point of Banking operations. With this, even if one has different bank accounts in different banks, the BVN links all the accounts to the owner, and all the accounts are traceable to the owner.
- READ ALSO: How To Check BVN On Airtel
Why Do Loan Apps Ask For BVN?
The main reason online loan apps in Nigeria ask for BVN is to verify the real identity of the customer that wants to take a loan from them. With this, they also get to know the credit score of the customer, the financial status of the customer. This helps them to determine whether it is safe to give a loan to the customer or not. If it is a customer that always or has borrowed loans in other platforms without paying back, the BVN would help the loan platform to find that out.
Without the BVN, some bad customers may just use fake names and details to borrow money from online loan apps without paying back, and it would be difficult to trace the customers. So, with the help of the BVN, if a customer refuses to pay back their loans, it would be easy for the loan app to report the person to the Credit Burea.
Having said these, you can see that there may be no bad intention in loan apps asking for BVN, except it is a fake loan app that has another intention, if at all such exists.
Loan App Without BVN in Nigeria
We want to be sincere here, there is almost no loan app in Nigeria that does not ask for BVN, almost all of them ask for BVN. If you check on Google, you may see different articles listing many loan apps, claiming that they don’t ask for BVN. but when you check each of the loan apps listed, you will see that they ask for BVN.
In the articles we found on Google about loan apps without BVN, some of the loan apps most of them listed there were: Okash, FairMoney, Jumia Pay, PalmPay, PalmCredit, etc. But when we checked each of the apps, we found out that all of them ask for BVN.
We always want to be sure of the information we dish out, that’s why we always take our time to do intensive research before giving out any information. What we did was to download each of the loan apps and register there. We tried applying for loans on each of the apps, but all of them required our BVN.
We continued downloading more, different loan apps to know if there is anyone that will not ask for BVN. in the course of doing this, we have found only one loan app where you must not put your BVN to take a loan; and the loan app is called NewCredit. Though NewCredit asks for BVN, it makes it optional for those that don’t have BVN. However, those that don’t have BVN must have to enter their National Identification Number (NIN). With the NIN, they will also have access to your real information.
We will still keep checking more loan apps to know if we can see any other that does not ask for BVN. Once we see any, we are going to update this article right away.
List of Loan Apps We have Checked
As said earlier, in the course of searching for loan apps without BVN, we downloaded about 9 loan apps and registered there, to see if we would be able to get loans without BVN. But all of them require our BVN before we can get a loan. Here, we are going to list the loan apps we have checked, and attach screenshots as proofs.
1. New credit
Among all the loan apps we checked, NewCredit was the only one that made BVN optional for those that don’t have BVN. However, NIN was their compulsive alternative to BVN. That is, any customer that doesn’t have a BVN must have to enter their NIN.
But in other loan apps we checked, BVN was a compulsory requirement.
2. Okash
On Okash, we found out that BVN was a compulsory requirement for loans.
3. FairMoney
4. Palmpay
5. PalmCredit
6. Ease Cash
7. RenMoney
8. Jumia Pay
9. EasiMoney
Is It Safe To Enter My BVN on Loan Apps?
As long as it’s a trusted loan app, we can say that there may not be any harm in providing your BVN to get a loan. You will definitely be safe, as they don’t have any bad intention in collecting your BVN. They only want to use it to verify your identity.
Moreover, it is no more easy for scammers to collect people’s money through BVN. Before now, there have been reports of scammers using people’s BVN to siphon their money from their bank account. During this time, it seems once scammers have your BVN, they can easily steal money from your bank account. But it seems it’s no more like that now, because Banks seem to have updated their security, such that even if someone has your BVN, they won’t still be able to use it to take money from your bank account.
We are also aware of how some loan apps call the contacts of their defaulting customers. If this is the reason you are afraid of giving them your BVN, then you can actually stop them from accessing your contacts from your settings. You can check the guide below to see how you can do that.
Moreover, the Federal Government of Nigeria is strictly against loan apps calling contacts or harassing their customers in any form. This has made the Government to ban some of the loan apps that indulge in such acts. And in any case you feel harassed by any loan platform, you can simply report such a loan app, and they will get sanctioned.
But most of these loan apps will never call your contacts if you didn’t fail to pay your loan on time, those that call contacts, do that only when a customer fails to pay up their loans on the due date. If you always pay your loan as agreed, you will never face harassment from these loan apps. This is why we always advise that you should never take a loan if you don’t have any means of paying back on or before the due date. Before you take a loan from any loan app, make sure there is a sure means of getting the money to pay back on or before the due date.
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Conclusion
Almost all the loan apps in Nigeria ask for BVN before you can take a loan from them. In all the loan apps we checked, only NewCredit made BVN optional for those that don’t have BVN, but they must have to provide their National Identification Number (NIN) as an alternative to BVN.
However, there may not be need to worry about providing your BVN while taking a loan from a loan app, as long as it’s a trusted platform. They don’t mean any harm for asking your BVN, they only want to verify your real identity.
