The Bank of Mozambique (BoM) reported that Mozambican consumers filed a total of 1,788 complaints in 2024 against various banking entities operating in the country. According to the central bank’s records, of the total number of complaints, 979 were registered in the first half of the year and 809 in the second half.
According to the Lusa publication, most of the complaints involve institutions controlled by Portuguese banks and with more than one million customers, i.e. ‘the complaints received last year were mainly directed at Banco Comercial e de Investimentos, part of the Caixa Geral de Depósitos group, and Millennium bim, part of the Millennium BCP group’.
‘In the list of banks with 200,000 to one million customers, Absa Moçambique, Standard Bank and Moza Banco also received some complaints,’ added the Bank of Mozambique.
The complaints filed in this period were about the operation of ATM machines, namely money not being made available and debited from the account, about credit operations and about bank accounts, with undue debits and blockages.
Last year, the central bank reported that complaints from banking system customers grew by 38.5 per cent in 2023, to 1120, culminating in the return of 808 million meticals (12.5 million dollars) to consumers.
In its recent annual report for 2023, the financial institution said that from the complaints received and the inspections carried out ‘various irregularities were detected’, above all ‘in the collection of commissions and charges for financial products and services.’
‘In addition to issuing specific determinations and recommendations to ensure compliance with standards and duties of conduct by Credit Institutions and Financial Companies (ICSF), around 808 million meticals were recovered and returned to financial consumers,’ it said. Of this amount, 62.6 per cent (the equivalent of 506 million meticals) resulted from undue charges to economic agents contracting POS, and 33 per cent (264 million meticals) came from undue charging of commissions and charges for contracting and administering bank credit.
By the end of 2023, Mozambique had a total of 15 banks, 14 microbanks, four credit cooperatives, 13 savings and loan organisations and 2,304 microcredit operators, among other types.
