Lots of small business owners want to know if they need to link their Bank Verification Number or BVN to SMEDAN portal. The answer is yes!
And you know why?
The full benefits of SMEDAN are in its subscription services and this can only happen when you link your BVN to your SMEDAN Identification Number.
After registering your business, you will have to activate your BVN on SMEDAN portal to pre-qualify for a loan, and activate your policy and other benefits.
Cost of SMEDAN Subscription Packages
The SMEDAN subscription services include:
- Business Insurance Coverage
- Business loan
- Jobberman-supported training such as soft skills and financial literacy
The subscription packages are not free, here is the cost:
- Monthly: N200
- Quarterly: N600
- Bi-annual: N1,200
- Annual: N2,400
Ready to make this move, then, you can move to the next stage of verifying your BVN by linking it to your SMEDAN details.
Link Your BVN to Your SMEDAN Number
Getting access to the full benefits SMEDAN portal offers is by linking your bank verification number to the platform.
You can link your BVN to your SMEDAN number with these nine easy steps:
- Login to your dashboard
- If you’re on a laptop/desktop, click on “SMEDAN benefits” from the left hand side
- And click “”Activate benefits”
- Read, understand, and agree to the terms and conditions
- On the next page, select your preferred duration of coverage: monthly, quarterly, bi-annual, and yearly
- Choose your preferred subscription package
- Make payment
- You’ll be returned to the BVN verification page
- Enter your BVN and date of birth
NOTE:
The date of birth you input must match the one on your Bank Verification Number.
If there are no issues with your BVN, you will receive a successful registration message that you’ve “subscribed to the VAS package”.
My thought:
I don’t think is worth it to subscribe to SMEDAN packages for the following reasons:
One, anyone can access Jobberman soft skills online. Besides, Jobberman isn’t the only platform where small business owners can gain access to soft skills, other platforms include Coursera, Alinson etc.
The SMEDAN subscription package is like “pay money to get access to a loan”. The agency was conceived by the administration of former President Olusegun Obasanjo to boost macroeconomic activities towards the vision 20:20-20 at the time.
SMEDAN was not designed to take anything from struggling small business owners who are finding it challenging to cope with the unfavorable business environment.
The government should find a way to remove all impediments of accessing single-digit business loans NOT to indirectly mandate MSMEs to pay to have access to full benefits of the agency.
