Satisfaction - finding fulfilment with an online banking service

I wouldn't know how banking works in your country, but for us in Nigeria it has been nothing short disappointing. But not too long ago, I opened an account with an online bank (usually called neobanks) and I must say it has been one of the decisions that brought back my faith in the banking system. And what more, I have felt super satisfied and happy with everything about their service. So when I read that **Satisfaction is the theme for this month of March, I did not look far to choose this experience as my entry for the month's topic.

For you to understand why I feel so satisfied signing up with this online bank, let me tell you a bit about the general state of banking in Nigeria, especially since recently.

Getting money out of the bank is terrible

Over the years, we do not have the best banking services in my country. But since the CBN rolled out a project to change some old bank notes on January 31st 2023, everything about our banking system came crashing down. The bank networks crumbled and it became virtually difficult to perform basic banking transactions online. Here are just 2 of the many challenges that made banking a nightmare over here:

• Mobile transfers took days: Imagine where you need to send money quickly to solve an emergency only for the transaction to freeze. You cannot have your money and the recipient cannot have it too. So both parties are left stranded. Banking networks now take days to complete a simple money transfer that usually take seconds to do.

• Cash is scarce and expensive to get: Because the government want to change old notes, they gave a deadline for everyone to return their old notes to the bank. We all did. Unfortunately, the new notes were nowhere to be found. The few POS operators that have it, sell it at terribly expensive rates. So the entire Nigerian population are left stranded with no cash to solve daily needs.

I am completely satisfied with FairMoney MFB

Note: This is not any form of endorsement, but my personal experience using fairMoney.

So with all the challenges and frustration that traditional banking has turned into, I decided to return to one of the online banks I have signed up with earlier. The name of this one is FairMoney Micro-finance Bank. Just as I said before, its fully an online bank as their are no physical branches built in any city.

I updated the FairMoney app from Playstore 2 months ago and I have been using the bank for my transactions. I have been completely satisfied the way this bank operates. Here are some 3 things that made me find great satisfaction in FairMoney:

• Super fast network: Unlike our traditional banks where currently transactions might take days to complete, Fairmoney transactions are very fast. When someone sends me money, I receive it within minutes. And when I make transfers to other people, it does not take long to arrive. I feel greatly satisfied with their speed of transaction,

• Discounts on bills: I discovered that there are discounts when I use my Fairmoney account to pay for bills. Other banks will charge for paying bills. But Fairmoney gives discounts instead. You can see a screenshot of my wallet below:

As you can see above, they give 3% discount each on purchases of airtime and data. That is really cool and I couldn't be happier with Fairmoney.

• Daily Interest on savings: Traditional banks do not pay interest at all. Instead, they deduct money from my account in the name of service charges. Fairmoney is unique again here. They do not charge money on transactions. Aditionally, they pay 10% interest per annum on savings as you can see below from this screenshot:

There are many other reasons why I feel so satisfied with FairMoney MFB. They give 30 free transactions every month. That means I can send money and do other 30 transactions completely free, no charges. That is amazing too.

Taking my Satisfaction to a New Level

I already have 2 bank debit cards. But because of how satisfied I was with Fairmoney, I decided to order their own Debit card from their head office at Lagos. Again, like they always do, it came within 48 hours of placing the online order.

The courier delivered it to my address 2 days ago (25/3/2023). I have not really activated the card. I will do it today. But I am happy to share some images of the card with I took in excitement.

Satisfaction is not such a difficult thing

I personally do not have high expectations in life. Living in a developing country with leaders that fail expectations has taught me to have modest expectations. I like many others, have been managing the poor bank services over the years here, but I do not complain. But when it got to not being able to use your own money, the challenge became something else.

Fairmoney is not perfect as there are times too when the network is bad. But overall, they are far more exceptional compared to what we have in other banks. I feel happy and satisfied that I can do all my transactions and business without having to fear of poor networks.

In life, things will always get better if we do not give up, keep fighting and hoping for the best. For me, I feel very satisfied with the online bank service. You too will find fulfilment if you keep on trying!

NOTE: All images are mine, captured with my Redmi Note 11 Smartphone