Opening a bank account

A licensed bank

No bank can operate in Cameroon without a licence from the Central African Banking Commission (COBAC), which supervises banks across the whole CEMAC zone, Cameroon included. The list of licensed banks is public and includes the country's major players, such as Afriland First Bank, BICEC and SGBC. A bank is neither a savings cooperative nor a mobile-money service — those two forms of finance follow different rules, covered in two other Camerpedia explainers.

What a bank must show you

CEMAC regulation requires every bank to publish its tariff conditions: account-keeping fees, transfer costs, overdraft charges. Before opening an account, a customer has the right to ask for this fee schedule and to compare it across banks. A bank that refuses to show it, or that charges a fee missing from its published schedule, is breaking this rule.

A ceiling on the cost of credit

The same regulation sets the effective global rate, or TEG: the real cost of a loan once arrangement fees and loan insurance are added in. No bank in the CEMAC zone may charge above the usury ceiling fixed for the region. That ceiling protects a borrower from an abnormally expensive loan, even when the rate first quoted looks reasonable.

Before you sign

The contract you sign when opening an account should match the bank's published fee schedule, not a fee quoted only verbally. That schedule, more than a bank officer's pitch, is what to compare before choosing where to bank. It remains the reference point if a fee is later disputed.

If something goes wrong

A customer disputing a fee, or who thinks a bank has charged above the legal usury ceiling, can raise it with COBAC. COBAC is the same authority that licensed the bank in the first place, and it can withdraw that licence if the bank stops following CEMAC's rules.