How to check a Nigerian business is real before you pay

The short answer

The single most useful check is the account name on the transfer screen. If you are paying a company and the account resolves to an individual, stop. Everything else in this guide is about the cases where that check passes and you still want to be careful.

The six checks, in order

1. Read the account name before you send anything. Nigerian bank transfers show the recipient name before you confirm. A registered business should be receiving into an account in the business name. Payment to a personal account “because the company account is having issues” is the most common single step in the losses people write to us about.
2. Check the CAC registration. The Corporate Affairs Commission runs a public search at search.cac.gov.ng. Ask the business for its RC number (companies) or BN number (business names), then look it up. You are checking three things: that the number exists, that the name matches exactly, and that the status is active. A business that will not give you its RC number when asked politely has told you something.
3. Call the number and listen to how it is answered. Not whether it connects, how it is answered. A real business answers with the business name. Ask something only an insider would know, like which days they close early or where to park. Hesitation is information.
4. Test the address independently. Put it into a map before you trust it. In most Nigerian cities the useful address is a landmark rather than a street number, so ask them to describe the location the way they would to a driver. Someone who cannot describe their own street is not standing on it.
5. Look for a trading history, not a marketing history. A page full of testimonials posted in the same week is a launch, not a track record. Look for evidence spread across time: reviews in different months, photographs with different backgrounds, mentions somewhere the business does not control.
6. Search the name with the word that matters. Search the business name plus “scam”, plus “refund”, and plus “court”. It takes ninety seconds. It occasionally saves everything.

The three patterns that precede most losses

• Urgency that benefits them. The price expires today, the last unit is going, another buyer is on the way. Every one of these is designed to remove the fifteen minutes this guide takes.
• A switch in payment method at the last moment. You agreed card, they now want transfer. You agreed the company account, they now want a personal one. The switch is the tell, not the method.
• Refusal to put it in writing. A legitimate seller will send you the price, the item and the delivery date in a message you can keep. “Just call me” keeps everything deniable.

Extra checks for regulated purchases

Some categories have a regulator whose register is the real check, and the business should be able to name theirs without flinching.

• Medicines and food products carry NAFDAC registration numbers on the packaging. Pharmacies themselves are registered with the Pharmacists Council of Nigeria.
• Doctors and dentists are registered with the Medical and Dental Council of Nigeria. A clinic should be able to tell you the name of the doctor who will actually see you.
• Insurance is regulated by NAICOM, and investment products by the SEC. An investment offer from an entity that is not SEC-registered is not an investment offer.
• Banks and deposits sit under the CBN, with deposit insurance through the NDIC. “Returns” that beat every bank in the country are not a better bank.

If it has already gone wrong

Move quickly and in this order: tell your bank in writing the same day and ask them to log a disputed transaction; keep every message, receipt and account number; and take a written complaint to the business itself so there is a record of it refusing. Beyond that, the Federal Competition and Consumer Protection Commission handles consumer complaints, and a police report is what most banks will ask for before doing anything further.

Ranked is a directory. We can correct or remove wrong listing information and pass on a documented complaint, and we say so plainly in our reporting flow. We are not a party to your transaction and cannot force a refund. Anyone who tells you they can, for a fee, is running the second scam.

Bottom line

The account name, the RC number and a phone call cover most of the risk for most purchases. They cost fifteen minutes and no money. The people who lose money almost never skipped these checks because they were hard. They skipped them because someone made them feel there was no time.