As commercial banks and other financial institutions commence new SMS alert fee charges, the lingering Unstructured Supplementary Service Data (USSD) debt impasse between banks and telecommunication companies has been fully settled.

MTN Nigeria’s chief executive officer, Karl Toriola, confirmed the development during an interview on Arise Television as he spoke on the Q1 financial results of the firm.

Incurring USSD debts lead to disconnections

Legit.ng reported that Nigeria’s leading telco returned to profitability after grossing N1 trillion in revenue earnings, buoyed by data prices and naira stability.

The USSD debt had been a major issue between the two critical sectors in Nigeria’s economy, lasting over five years.

In the third quarter of 2024, the telcos disconnected some commercial banks over the debt, which was about N200 billion.

CBN and NCC intervene

The disconnection led to the intervention of the Central Bank of Nigeria(CBN) and the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC).

According to reports, as of November last year, the telecom regulator put the outstanding debt at N160 billion.

The directive by the NCC to disconnect debtor banks prompted the financial institutions to comply with an earlier directive by the apex bank, which revealed a payment plan.

However, the MTN Nigeria boss, Toriola, confirmed that the issue has been fully settled and that banks have paid.

He said:

“I can confirm that the matter has been fully resolved. We have received payments in full. Special thanks to the CBN, NCC, the banks, and other stakeholders that intervened in the matter.”

Telcos start charging for USSD service from airtime

The Guardian reported that in April 2025, the chairman of the Association of Licensed Telecom Operators of Nigeria (ALTON), Gbenga Adebayo, disclosed that the issue was receiving urgent attention from the parties.

He said that telecom subscribers will soon start paying for using USSD with deductions from their airtime rather than bank deposits, Legit.ng reported.

The end-user billing system refers to a system in which customers are charged directly for using the USSD service, rather than the service provider being charged.

The development to resolve future USSD debt

The development means customers’ airtime is debited for the USSD session, despite any subsequent charges by the bank.

Experts say this is a departure from the traditional corporate billing system, where banks were charged for USSD use.

The ALTON boss said talks are ongoing and the modalities are being put in place to conglomerate subscribers, telcos and the banks into a suite.

According to him, the end-user billing system, advocated for by the banks, may help to guard against accumulated debts, as seen in the impasse between the banks and telcos.

MTN Nigeria spends N202 billion on network upgrade

Legit.ng earlier reported that MTN Nigeria said it has invested N202.4 billion, representing 159% yearly, in infrastructure upgrades and network expansion to boost service delivery and capacity.

The company disclosed this in its unaudited financials for Q1 2025, saying its subscribers grew by 8.2% to 84.1 million, an addition of 3.2 million subscribers during the review period.

The telco disclosed that its active data users increased by 13.0% to 50.3 million, an additional 2.6 million users.