- Slams customers’ service policies as unfriendly, frustrating
In the inner mind of a onetime presidential aspirant and veteran Nollywood actor, Ayo Lijadu, it seems his bankers of many years, the Guaranty Trust Bank (GTB) Plc, is not wishing him well and the long life that many people covet as mere mortals here on earth.
And Lijadu is not finding it funny. No thanks to what he alleged as a lack of a customer-friendly environment in the bank, classified among the new-generation financial institutions that have grown to become one of the most respected and service-focused banks in Nigeria
In raising the alarm, the Nollywood Old timer said GTBank has been grossly insensitive and unfair to him despite being their credit-worthy customer for over two and a half decades still running.
Lijadu, whose recent acting performance is featuring as Shila Girdia’s father in the popular TV soap opera, Tinsel, chronicled his ugly experience with the bank thus; “I have been banking with GTB for more than twenty-five years and I can say with every confidence that I am credit-worthy.
“For the past eight years, apart from other sundry incomes from other side hustles, they have been accepting an average of Five Hundred Thousand Naira (N500,000) every month without fail into my salary account with them from my regular job. Cumulatively therefore, since the past eight years of my banking with GTBANK, (leaving out the rest seventeen years), at least 48 million Naira of my money had been lodged in that bank. 48 Million Naira. Let’s make that 50 Million Naira for a round figure.
“All these years I have been banking with GTBank, I had never asked for nor received any loan facility from my bank, which should be my natural right so to do. That is part of the benefits that bank customers who are credit-worthy should be entitled to, as of right.
“However, in recent times, since about two years ago, each time I needed an urgent facility from my bank to meet an urgent need, even as small as One Hundred Thousand Naira (N100,000), as salary advance, or quick credit, they turn me down as being ineligible by reason of my age, (over 60 years)”.
Offering further insights on his ordeal, Lijadu, who was an editor of the Daily Times as a practicing journalist, said; “You received 50 million Naira, but cannot give out 100 thousand Naira in time of urgent need? You cannot give a sixty-eight-year-old man a bank facility, which by all other criteria, apart from age, he is eligible for, but you are not ashamed to collect over 600k every month for the past year from the same old man.
“Even if I were to ask for a facility of Two (2) million Naira, so long as I have the collateral for it, (of which I have more than five times that value in landed property), and was prepared to put down, it should be an automatic approval. Why are the elderly so disrespected, disdained, and discriminated against in this country by institutions that are expected to support them and provide them with as much succour as possible in their elderly age?
“By telling me that my age disqualifies me from getting a loan, (which by all other considerations attached to having a healthy bank account history and collateral I am eligible for), you’re telling me that I may die before I can pay back my loan.”
Further taking a swipe at the annoying customer-relations policy of GT Bank, the actor, who also featured in the controversial “Gangs Of Lagos” as ‘Alaye’ said; “That is not a good insinuation, (whether directly or indirectly), directed at someone whom you use his money on a regular basis to trade with. The thought itself can be psychologically devastating.”
Looking back at his over 25 years and still counting relationship with the financial institution, the veteran thespian queried; “GTBank, are you wishing me dead any time soon?”.
