• A payment can look successful to a customer while the beneficiary is still waiting for the money, according to fintech executive Michael Adesola.
• Adesola told the Nigerian Fintech Forum that payment rails, processors, switches, identity systems, APIs, cybersecurity and connectivity all sit behind a digital transaction.
• His comments are an industry view on resilience, not a finding that any named bank or app is currently failing—or a guide to any individual transfer.
A buyer lifts a phone over the counter. The seller checks an alert, checks again, then looks back at the customer. The small drama is familiar: one screen says “successful”; the person meant to receive the money has nothing to show for it yet.
That last-mile tension was the point of a recent PUNCH report from the Nigerian Fintech Forum, where Belema Fintech acting MD/CEO Michael Adesola argued that the next test for African fintech is not just how fast products grow, but how dependable the systems underneath them are when pressure arrives.
The buyer and seller see one broken promise
Adesola’s point is brutally simple from a customer’s side. The buyer does not care whether a delay sits with a bank, a processor, a switch or another provider. The seller does not want to release an item before settlement is clear. Both people see one problem: a payment that has not finished doing the job its screen suggested it had done.
The app is not the whole payment
The familiar interface is only the visible layer. Adesola named payment rails, processing platforms, switching infrastructure, identity services, APIs, cybersecurity, connectivity and redundancy as parts of the machinery that determine whether a transfer can be delivered. That is not an excuse for a poor experience. It explains why a pretty app cannot settle a transaction by itself.
Why the last mile changes a sale
For a small seller, the gap can turn a quick exchange into a stand-off. Stock is in hand, another customer may be waiting and the buyer may be sure they have paid. A digital business lives on repeat trust, so the real question is not merely whether an alert appeared; it is whether the beneficiary can confirm that the money has landed.
Resilience is the unglamorous product feature
Adesola called for systems to be stress-tested, for redundancy to be built into critical services and for greater interoperability across the ecosystem. Those are recommendations from an industry player, not evidence that reforms have already solved the problem. But they put the spotlight in the right place: reliability is part of the product, even when users never see the infrastructure.
The next time a seller asks a buyer to wait for confirmation, that pause is not just awkward counter talk. It is a reminder that digital trust is built at the exact moment the money is expected to arrive.
Also read: NIBSS has a new payment digest. Why it matters beyond fintech boardrooms
Also read: The phone gap is still shutting women out of digital finance. Why inclusion starts before the app.
What makes you trust a transfer enough to release a sale: the alert, the balance confirmation or a reversal plan? Tell us in the comments.
