Central Bank of Nigeria
Payments System Supervision Department
Plot 33, Abubakar Tafawa Balewa Way
Central Business District
P.M.B. 0187 Garki, Abuja- Nigeria.
E-mail: [email protected]
Website: www.cbn.gov.ng
Phone: +234 700 225 5226,+234 800 225 5226
PSS/DIR/PUB/CIR/001/001
August 25, 2025
CIRCULAR TO:
All Deposit Money Banks. (DMBs)
Microfinance Banks (MFBs)
Mobile Money Operators (MMOs)
Switching and Processing Companies
Payment Terminal Service Providers (PTSPs),
Payment Solution Service Providers (PSSPs)
Super Agents
Any Other Licensed Operators in the Nigerian Payments Ecosystem.
MIGRATION TO ISO 20022 STANDARD FOR PAYMENT MESSAGING AND
MANDATORY GEO-TAGGING OF PAYMENT TERMINALS
Further to previous circuliars isued by the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) on the
migration to the ISO 20022 messaging standard for payments and settiemen
messaging and in alignment with the SWIFT global migration timelines (circulars
BKS/DIR/GEN/CIR/07/017 and BKS/CRO/GEN/BNK/04/061. dated July 17, 2020 and
September 23. 2020 respectively), allicensed operators are hereby reminded that
ISO 20022 is the standard for payment messaging to support Nigeria's payments
objective of ensuring standardized quality data
In addition to previous migration instructions, he following directives now apply to all
institutions in scope
ISO 20022 Compliance
All payment ransaction
messages
xchanged domesticall
internationally must be formatted in ISO 20022 in line with CBN and
SWIFT specifications
All Institutions shall ensure complete and accurate population of
identifiers,
ayer/payee
elements, inacluding
ata
mandatory
merchant/agent identifiers, and transaction metadata.
i Al in-scope institutions must complete migration activities and be full
compllant not later than October 31, 2025.