Chinwendu Obienyi
Vivian Onyebukwa, a journalist with one of the national dailies and 1,044 Nigerians accross the country, emerged winners yesterday at the quarterly senior citizens and women’s draw of the DiamondXtra Season 11 reward scheme powered by Access Bank Plc.
Speaking shortly after receiving the N500,000 prize cheque, Onyebukwa told newsmen that she had been a customer of Access Bank for years, adding that she never knew she would emerge winner someday.
“I feel so happy and so excited. I never believe I would become a winner in the first place. All I had to do was to top my DiamondXtra Savings account which I started with N5000 before I constantly topped it with bigger amounts which as a result made me N500,000 richer today. I want to say a big thank you to Access Bank, I will also encourage other Nigerians, especially my colleagues to partake in this initiative because this bank ends up making their customers happy.”
Also speaking, Head, Retail Products, Access Bank Plc, Robert Giles, explained that the Diamondxtra initiative has been running for 11 years and have constantly grown with the number of prizes given out every year, adding that a total of N50 million was given out in form of cash to winners accross the country.
“As at the end of last year, we have given out N5 billion in prizes since inception. We had over 20,000 beneficiaries and as at last year, we had over 4,000 beneficiaries in which we gave out N50 million today. One of the things we have been changing based on the feedback is that salary for life is great and every year we have added more in terms of giving out education allowance for five years, senior citizens are also inclusive, rent for a year as well as ad-hoc draws throughout the year to make it more accessible and create more stories for our customers”, Giles said.
According to him, the initiative has been successful in growing the deposit base of the bank as it gives Nigerians the chance to win something that could transform their lives.
“Now we are seeing that customers are able to use that fund to start new businesses and dramatically change their lives. It has been very successful for Access Bank and it has been something that has grown a stable depositable base for the bank and part of our strategy for growing deposits which is very valuable to the bank.
Deposits do affect the bottomline but customer relationships affect the bottomline more and so the more customers relate with us, not just storing money but making transactions by having a card that works, an app that works or being able to link you to other products like being able to transfer money abroad using Access africa and so we look at rather the relationship rather than deposit banking”, he said.
Giles thereafter assured that the Season 12 which will kick off next month will see Access Bank stay true to keeping the DiamondXtra initiative.
Corroborating him, Group Head, Consumer banking, Access Bank, Adaeze Umeh, noted that next season will see the bank add more exciting features as well as more winners.
“Season 12 is going to be much bigger because we have gotten feedbacks and insights from our customers. This initiative has been there for 11 years and so we have a lot of strong followership and each season we try to build in what our customers loved and will want in a new season as it is a product aimed at transforming lives. So we encourage Nigerians to keep fate in us even as we get to launch the new season next month”, she said.